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Post by humphrey on Jul 24, 2011 22:24:12 GMT
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Post by shane on Jul 24, 2011 22:59:39 GMT
I read McCarthy's book before and found it fascinating. There was a book published (the name escapes me), responding to McCarthy's assertions, combined with reminiscences of priests and people in Ireland, soon after 'Priests and People in Ireland' was published. You might also want to check out 'Catholicity and Progress in Ireland' by Fr Michael O'Riordan, responding to Horace Plunkett's assertions. www.archive.org/stream/cu31924029383977#page/n0/mode/2up
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 28, 2011 21:10:23 GMT
I have a reference to McCarthy in my review of Curtis for the BRANDSMA (if it isn't boiled down). Basically McCarthy was a Catholic Unionist who turned Protestant while continuing to describe himself (misleadingly) as Catholic. Indeed he allied with the most hardline factions of Unionism - his book ROME IN IRELAND essentially endorses the Penal Laws and accuses the (Protestant/rationalist) historian Lecky of pro-Catholic bias on the subject. His central themes may be summed up as follows: (1) Catholicism is essentially a clerical conspiracy by which priests enrich themselves by keeping their flocks ignorant and poor (by siphoning off their money to build extravagant churches and live lives of luxury). All priests may be assumed to be deliberately dishonest and guilty of any crime you care to ascribe to them. Believing Catholics are so evidently delusional as to be incapable of self-government. (2) Protestants, by virtue of being Protestants (he quite clearly defines this in antiCatholic terms; i.e the absence of belief in sacraments) are inheritors of every virtue unless they are corrupted by Catholic influence. Their righteousness is shown by their greater worldly prosperity, which is entirely due to Protestantism and has nothing to do with colonialism, discrimination etc. The British Empire is based on Protestantism and endangered by tolerating Romanism and (Anglican High Church) Ritualism. (3) The economy should be run on pure laissez-faire Social Darwinist lines. The Irish Land agitation was simply an immoral conspiracy of the ignorant and improvident to enrich themselves at the expense of the strong and hard-working, and should have been put down by criminal law. Where Catholic (or Anglican) charities are not simply scams to enrich priests, they are plots to strengthen the Church by winning the support of the vulgar and vicious many against the strong and enlightened minority. The law should not recognise Catholic belief (or Irish nationalism) as deserving any sort of respect or recognition, even in matters of conscience, The beauty of this is that many present-day writers take McCarthy's self-description as a Catholic at face value and swallow all his criticisms of clerical influence (I should add that not all his individual criticisms are wrong) as the work of an impartial observer. Specially recommended for connoisseurs of bigotry are: his novel GALLOWGLASS, OR LIFE IN THE LAND OF THE PRIESTS which inter alia describes the appointment of Irish bishops as being conducted by a Dutch auction among priests (money payable to Rome in advance and the losers don't get repaid) his book on the Russo-Japanese War in which all the Russians' shortcomings are attributed to the Orthodox belief in sacrificial priesthood, while the Japanese are exalted as honorary Protestants in all but name. his book on CHURCH AND STATE IN ENGLAND AND WALES in which the Church of England is accused of conspiring to establish a clerical tyranny in Britain on the Irish Catholic model.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 7, 2011 17:39:35 GMT
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 9, 2011 15:58:20 GMT
Two little straws in the wind about how a vicious anti-Catholicism is becoming embedded in aspects of Irish popular culture (1) When the satirical Limerick duo the Rubberbandits appeared recently as a warm-up act at the Oxegen music festival they did a routine as paedophile priests (at one point appeaaring bare-chested while wearing Roman collars and black trousers) with male backing singers who initially appeared dressed as altar boys before stripping down to skimpy shorts. (2) A recent report on the Edinburgh Fringe festival metions Ailbe Philbin Bowman staging a comedy routine entitled POPE BENEDICT; BOND VILLAIN presumably on the strength of the Pope's German accent. If you think this is trivial, ask yourself what would the response be to a show entitled DAVID NORRIS: BOND VILLAIN (remember Bond villains, especially in the earlier stories, are often sexually ambiguous)
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Post by humphrey on Aug 9, 2011 18:47:53 GMT
I believe Abie Bowman is the son of John Bowman the RTE presenter. In interview I heard he described now he was brought up as an atheist and how strange this was in the Ireland up until when the scandals broke. Once they scandals happened he was able to evangelize for the Atheist cause among his friends at school
Following him on twitter I get the overwhelming impression that he is a bien peasant. He also did a show mocking Bush and American Christianity during his presidency. Certainly a subject that could be mocked without fear of retribution in Ireland or Britain. He agitated for the Nuncio to be expelled and when the nuncio left, absurdly, claims a moral victory against the great Satan. When Norris fell he spent the day searching for the nuances of the story, trying to understand how a person who is axiomatically good could act in such a way. Denis O Callaghan of course just acted out the doctrines of wickedness itself the Catholic Church.
Comedians foster this self-serving myth that they make fun of the powerful and complacent. Contemporary comedy at least is nothing like this. It is fundamentally about re-enforcing the worldview of the people who are paying. Libertine, soft left, secular etc. In a sense they are little different to playground bullies. The sad thing is that Bowman represents the attitudes that can found on every College campus in the country. The extreme vulgarity of the Rubberbandits represents that which can be seen on town streets on a Saturday night.
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Post by humphrey on Aug 9, 2011 19:58:43 GMT
A recent example of anti-Catholicism is the calumny that the Vatican has a age of consent of 12. A person raises it on twitter and such is the nature of the beast that people repeat it without ever doubting such an extraordinary statement. Last year Stephen Fry on his QI program repeated this calumny as fact. So much for the London sceptics being 'evidence based'. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe#Vatican_State Wikipedia explains why this wrong. The best way, IMO, to prove that the Vatican hasn't controlled it's own civil laws since 1929, is that same sex activity has been legal since the Lateran treaty as well.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 12, 2011 20:18:55 GMT
Mark Dooley has a very good interview in the current CATHOLIC HERALD in which he talks about the extent to which the Irish professional classes are permeated by active hatred for Catholicism, saying this has been the case for longer than generally recognised. I think he is bang on the mark here - I move in academic circles and it is really striking how many people (especially younger academics) declare themselves atheists in conversation in a manner which assumes this to be self-evidently correct, and start from the assumption that Catholicism is self-evidently false and evil and not worth examining in depth.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 27, 2011 9:53:00 GMT
Here we see a newly-elected Cork east FG TD who has decided he would like some of what Inda's having: [bbc news] An Irish politician has said Catholics should not be asked to foot the bill from pay-outs to abuse victims. Fine Gael's Tom Barry was commenting on reports that Dublin Catholics could be asked to pay a levy to prevent the financial collapse of the archdiocese. The archdiocese has been hit by falling church collections and compensation bills for victims of clerical abuse. Mr Barry said Catholics should not have to pay for the hierarchy's failure to prevent abuse. "We should not be made pay for the wrongs that were committed, the Church itself should pay out" he said. The TD (member of Irish Parliament), a Catholic who lives in the Diocese of Cloyne, said the Catholic Church could easily pay the bill itself by selling off Vatican treasures. "As a father of young children I find this very difficult to accept, the church needs to show that it is sincere in its apology and the Church should be about religion not property if it takes the Vatican to start selling off items, so be it" he said. www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14682023Note the following assumptions: (1) The Church consists only of the bishops and priests, not the lay members (2) The collection will somehow be compulsory (3) The church should be about religion not property - the problem with this is that the property is supposed to be there for the support and propagation of religion and this was the basis on which former generations of Catholics gave to build it up (4) The "Vatican treasures" show the Church is immensely wealthy and they should be sold off before the laity are asked to contribute. OK, let's apply that logic elsewhere - how about selling off the Book of Kells and the contents of the National Gallery before asking taxpayers to contribute to the cost of the economic crisis? Anyone see the flaw in that? The trouble is that thanks to Bishop Magee & Co this probably will win some popularity for Mr Barry.
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Post by humphrey on Aug 29, 2011 20:58:13 GMT
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 30, 2011 19:38:43 GMT
Indeed - the haters are out in force in the combox. Professor Keogh has very good civil service contacts and is definitely on the liberal wing himself (sometimes with good reason - cf that point at the end about how the teacher who refused to allow an abuser-priest access to her class at risk of losing her job was a pupil of his) so when he says Inda just delivered his speech without taking diplomatic advice or considering possible consequences this can be taken seriously.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 30, 2011 19:42:15 GMT
On a lower level I noticed posters up on Dublin bus-shelters recently advertising some music festival sponsored by a brand of vodka. They show a large bottle of vodka whose outline is filled with humorously-drawn heads of people in fancy dress. When I looked more closely I noticed that one of the heads is of a Jesus-figure (with crown of thorns) winking with one eye and sticking out his tongue to show a Host on it. Just another example of how blasphemy has become part of "yoof" culture's adolescent desire to show how grown up its devotees are.
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Post by humphrey on Aug 30, 2011 20:48:38 GMT
Keogh is a liberal Catholic but that implies far too much sympathy for Catholicism for the typical internet secularist. Liberal Catholics have respect ,in their own way, for theology. Most commentators today seem to assume scientism is unquestionably true. Richard Dawkins might be having his desired affect.
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Post by humphrey on Aug 30, 2011 20:57:50 GMT
IMHO the festival ad "Jesus" is a product of poor religious education. The most striking aspect of reading the gospels is that Christ is a stern figure that condemns sin and says that the world will hate his followers.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 31, 2011 10:16:19 GMT
I think you miss the point slightly, Humphrey. The Vodka Festival Jesus was not portrayed as the Hippie Jesus stereotype you are referring to (and which is indeed well-known) but as a self-conscious spoofer conveying that nothing associated with Him (crown of thorns, eucharist) is anything more than a joke.
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