Pope @ MindSay 
catholic
You have to wonder what planet this man lives on that he is so out of touch. Don't use condoms? In a country where thousands of children are born every year with aids. The church should be distributing them for Goddess sake!
And sorcery and witchcraft....what was the turning water into wine, the raising from the dead, the healing by touch? Miracles according to the church....sorcery if done by someone not Catholic? Interesting twist to fit don't you think? But then the Bible is a book of propaganda just like others are .... not intended to be accepted as historical fact. Its a tool to brainwash masses of sheeple....to servitude of the status quo in power.
If he was so damned concerned for 'his children' then sell off the Vatican treasures and put your money where your mouth is.
By VICTOR L. SIMPSON, Associated Press Writer
LUANDA, Angola – Pope Benedict XVI appealed to the Catholics of Angola on Saturday to reach out to and convert believers in witchcraft who feel threatened by "spirits" and "evil powers" of sorcery. On his first pilgrimage to Africa, the pope drew on the more than 500 years of Roman Catholicism in Angola, saying that Christianity was a bridge between the local peoples and the Portuguese settlers. "In today's Angola," the pope said in a homily at Mass, "Catholics should offer the message of Christ to the many who live in the fear of spirits, of evil powers by whom they feel threatened, disoriented, even reaching the point of condemning street children and even the most elderly because — they say — they are sorcerers."
In Africa, some churchgoing Catholics also follow traditional animist religions and consult medicine men and diviners who are condemned by the church. People accused of sorcery or of being possessed by evil powers sometimes are killed by fearful mobs. Benedict counseled Catholics to "live peacefully" with animists and other nonbelievers and urged Angolans to be the "new missionaries" to bring people who believe in sorcery to Christ. Eighty percent of Angola's 16 million people are Christian, about 65 percent Catholic. Benedict spoke at a Mass at the capital's blue-domed St. Paul's Church, where light streamed through stained glass windows onto veiled nuns and priests and bishops resplendent in white and lilac robes. Before the invitation-only Mass for nuns and priests, Benedict was welcomed by a huge crowd. Children screamed their excitement and held up cell phones to take photographs of the 81-year-old pontiff. Young girls prostrated themselves before him in a sea of pink veils. People chanted and swayed to drumbeats and the rhythm of hymns in this tropical seaside capital. Many women wrapped their waists in cloth printed with photographs of the pope's face. The pope lovingly caressed the faces of children and sketched the cross on their foreheads.
Security was unusually tight, with military sharpshooters atop buildings in the capital. The National Police said they have deployed 10,000 officers. Security agents blocked cell phones in the church, apparently by sending a signal. Inside, veiled nuns and bishops resplendent in white robes with cerise belts and skull caps celebrated Mass with Benedict, who arrived in Luanda on Friday on the second leg of his tour of the continent with the fastest growing Catholic population in the world. "This is a very emotional day for me, my first time to get a Papal blessing," said Sister Iliria Olivera, from Oaxaca in Mexico, among hundreds of foreign missionaries in the church. Olivera for nine years has been working with her Sisters of the Divine Pastor, teaching children and running a maternal health clinic outside Luanda. After the Mass, the pope mounted a podium to bless the frenzied crowd of faithful who cheered him, crying out "Viva ao papa! Viva!" Tens of thousands of people lined the streets to get the pope's benediction, and he waved signs of the cross from his glass-topped vehicle as he processed through the capital.
On Friday, Benedict lamented what he called strains on the traditional African family, condemning sexual violence against women and chiding countries that have approved abortion. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, who is traveling with the pope, told journalists at a briefing Saturday that Benedict in that speech was referring to abortion when used as a means of "population control." Earlier in the weeklong trip, Benedict drew criticism from aid agencies and some European governments when he said that condoms were not the answer to Africa's severe AIDS epidemic, suggesting that sexual behavior was the issue. In his remarks to diplomats, Benedict also called for a "conversion of hearts" to rid Angola and the rest of Africa of corruption. Critics say last year's elections, which were swept by President Eduardo dos Santos' party, were marred by fraud and corruption. Dos Santos has been in power for 30 years. In his welcome speech after arriving from Cameroon on Friday, Benedict referred to Angola's poverty as well as its rich natural resources, saying the multitude of poor Angolans must not be forgotten. Angola is rich in diamonds and oil, but war and mismanagement have left most of its people in poverty.
The pope referred to his own childhood growing up in Nazi Germany, saying he had known war and national divisions and was keenly aware that dialogue was a way of overcoming "every form of conflict and tension and making every nation, including your own, into a house of peace and fraternity." Angola was lacerated by a civil war that started with its 1975 independence and ended in 2002. Its history as a former Portuguese colony has given the country Christian roots. Dos Santos said his government has good relations with the Vatican and he underlined the strong role the church plays in the country's recovery from nearly three decades of war. In a message of welcome published in the local press Saturday, he said "Today, the signs of reconstruction of Angola are already visible and we can say that the benefits of peace can be felt in the life of each citizen." Amnesty International on Saturday called on the pope to use his influence to halt the threat of forced evictions for residents of Luanda to make rise for high-rise apartments and office buildings. Many have been given cheap houses in faraway satellite towns that have no running water or electricity. Amnesty said that between 2003 and 2006, thousands of people were forcibly evicted from land belonging to the Catholic Church in three Luanda districts. Asked at the press briefing about Amnesty's allegations, Lombardi referred the question to an Angolan bishop, Monsignor Jose Manuel Imbamba. The prelate denied that anyone had been evicted or houses destroyed. "We help the poor, we don't send them away," Imbamba said.
___ AP correspondent Michelle Faul and reporter Casimiro Siona contributed to this report
By far as a result of the Jewish protests Pope Benedict XVI has halted beatification of Pius XII. Tensions are heightening between Vatican & Israel. According to Rev. Peter Gumpel, a Jesuit priest who is directing beatification efforts the pope would not visit Israel until a plaque criticizing Pius XII is removed from Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum.
Halting the beatification of Pius XII doesn't mean that Vatican is abonding the Pope's legacy. Last year, the Vatican passed a decree recognizing Pius’s heroic virtues, a key step toward sainthood, but Pope Benedict XVI has not yet approved the decree. Earlier this month, Pope Benedict XVI said Pope Pius XII had worked secretly & silently to save Jews & that he hoped the beatification can proceed happily.
Can now some one tell me why the people are making unnecessary controversies when the world needs whichever peace that is needed - whether between Nations or between Religions?
I was born a mongrel of two pure halves. My paternity is Spanish. My maternity is Jewish. By education, I am a Christian. By birth right, I am a Jew.
Some of these words come from my 95-year old grandmother. She was raised in a nunnery and spoke Spanish and English fluently. She was already a 4th Generation American when she was born in 1912.
I am not a priest. Nor have I ever been. But for 7 generations in America, and uncounted more before that, my father's fathers have been priests.
Catholic Priests. Spanish Priests. The best in the business. First sent forth to convert Europeans to Catholicism. Once that was successful, we went to the New World to continue the conversion to the Lord. And to find those Europeans that fled.
The Inquisition was very successful in the Americas as well. We started in what is now Mexico. Before 1865, the Spanish Empire covered most of North America, and huge amounts of South America. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Empire). Methodically, and very successfully, we converted the Central American Indians to the Church. The Europeans we were after fled North.
That is where the squeeze began. The Louisiana Purchase from France in 1803 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_Purchase) pushed the boundaries of the new United States against New Spain boundaries. And we needed the new American's help. The Comanche Indians had horses and strategy. The fleeing Europeans were cornered to the North and East by the New America. With the help of the New America, we 100% finished the job. There was, literally, no one but Catholics in Texas when it became a state.
"At the end of Spain's reign over Texas, virtually all inhabitants practiced the Catholic religion..." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Texas)
Where did all the displaced Europeans finally end up? We chased them to the edge of the continent. There was no where else to go. So far west, we didn't care. It is now called California. The Geffens, the Feinsteins, the Weinstiens, and the Spielbergs are in California, and not Texas. Nor many other places in the West.
After some bad publicity, the Inquisition changed its name: the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith before he earned ascension to His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congregation_for_the_Doctrine_of_the_Faith)
You know where this is heading.
We have a bad-ass Pope in charge.
We are about to be called back. The Moor's will again be chased out of Spain. The Muslims escorted back to the East. No GOVERNMENT can stop a Jihad. But one word from His Holiness, and the game is over.
http://www.msnbc. msn.com/id/ 26677884
PARIS - Pope Benedict XVI condemned unbridled “pagan” passion for power, possessions and money as a modern-day plague Saturday as he led more than a quarter of a million Catholics in an outdoor Mass in Paris.
Benedict was making his first visit as pontiff to the French capital, renowned for its luxury goods, fashion sense and cultural riches.
“Has not our modern world created its own idols?” Benedict said in his homily, and wondered aloud whether people have “imitated, perhaps inadvertently, the pagans of antiquity?”
____________ _________ _________ _________ _________
I admit that I am a pagan. I've been one for almost my entire life, and (having been blessed with varying results I might add) with a religiously diverse family both by blood and extended, I find the following comment made by the Pope to be offensive and of great concern on a variety of levels not only for myself but for others as well.
Firstly - the Catholic Church has more wealth than any pagan denomination that I am aware of. I struggle every month to make ends meet and have no leprechaun who helps me guard my pot of gold I ASSURE you.
Secondly - the rise of intolerance under the last two Popes (the last one called the rise of 'new age' return to Goddess based religions the single most threat to Catholicism) to also be of great concern and should be to every non-Catholic Christian as well as any and every non Christian.
Thirdly - the viewpoint that Catholicism is the only one true church and all others are destined to go to whatever hell is reserved for such individuals is the kind of mindset which has been used to justify numerous wars and persecutions under various leaders and religions since before the time of Jesus. To have a prominent religious leader come out with a statement like this gives weight and credence to other groups who use messages of hate to promote their own agendas. There are many uneducated (or those who choose not to educate themselves) individuals out there (I refer to them as sheeple) who will follow any leader and their beliefs blindly. The ones who vote the party ticket without thot because they've been a Democrat all their life or the ones who will follow a cult leader's dictates blindly and drink the poisoned cool-aid.
Lastly as an intelligent caring human being this offends and horrifies me.
The arrival of Catholic Youth in Sydney Australia.
World Youth Day is a Christian pilgrimage that is arriving in Sydney soon. Unfortunately.
Some well educated and sensible people in this country, planned to make a quiet and peaceful protest against some of the Roman Catholic churches' policies - such as birth control etc. The government however had other ideas. They passed several laws here last month, restricting the way in which Australians can express themselves and their opinions.
Check this out: It is now unlawful to offend the Catholic church or to display materials that may cause offence to the church OR the pope. That's right folks, you can't even wear a T-shirt with an offensive slogan on it. Not offensive to public sensibilities mind you, just offensive to catholics.
Don't they realise this is OZ?! This is just going to make us want to do it!!
That's what it's like to live in a country where you have no rights people, pay attention; Marshal law could be coming to a nation near you, soon.
Well I say:
FUCK THE CATHOLIC CHURCH!
FUCK THE POPE!
and
FUCK THE POLICE!
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