Mar 12, 2000, 11:20pm

Today the Pope apologized for all the past sins of the Catholic church to other religions, women, ethnic minorities, and even fellow Catholics.

Hrmmm.

Okay, so I believe Pope John Paul II to be humble, honest and forthcoming in his words. I believe he truly means them. I'm not a fan of the current Pope, because I believe he hasn't done enough to advance the Catholic cause into the 20th century, not to mention the 21rst century and the new millennium, what with his stand on women's issues, reform in the church, etc etc, but props to him for his statements today.

Does it change me?

You may or may not know, I'm a lapsed Catholic. I don't believe in God (though out of respect to those who do, I always capitalize His name, and I respect the opinions of those who do believe in Him). I wasn't always this way - I grew up believing in a God, in the Catholic Church, and in Jesus Christ.

Then I started to learn all the things the Catholic Church did in the name of Christ and God. Horrible events in history. The extermination of some races (Spaniards in America come to mind). The wholesale slaughter of countless people (the Crusades come to mind). The Spanish Inquisition, where thousands upon thousands of practicing Catholics were imprisoned for life or killed. The offhanded way Popes would hand out indulgences. The forgiveness of sins in return for payments. The way the Lord's name was used to advance careers and kill others.

Even in the modern age we see more corruption, and not always in the Catholic Church, but in the Christian world - televangelists taking the elderly for everything they own. Priests molesting little boys.

And the horror of all horrors of the 20th Century - the God I believed in would not let a monster known as Adoph Hitler even exist. Nor would he let a device like the Atomic bomb be dropped on two cities, killing hundreds of thousands of people.

By the time I was 15 or 16, I was thoroughly disillusioned. How could God, who supposedly gave his one and only Son to us, who participated in momentous events in history like the Ten Commandments, the parting of seas, visions, prophets, miracles left and right for 1000s of years in human life on this planet, all of a sudden turns a blind eye to what corruption, murder, and slaughter was being done in his name during the past 2000 years of human history? I couldn't buy it. I couldn't comprehend it.

I was still in Catholic school at the time (in my hometown, there was a public schoolboard and a Roman Catholic School board - it wasn't like going to private school when you attended a Catholic grade school, Junior High school, or High school), and these thoughts troubled me. I went to speak to my advisor, who was a "Brother" in the Catholic church (a step or two down from Priest level). I was rebuked, and lectured about my apparent gall and blasphemous behavior to question God's existence. "Permanent record will reflect this" is something I remember being mentioned. From that point on, I stopped believing in God. I also got the hell out of there, and transferred to a public (non-religious) school as soon as I could manage it.

So today, Pope John Paul II, the closest earthly man to God, has addressed many of my concerns, apologized for them, and offered no excuse. Good for him - there really is no excuse.

But does it change my mind? It really doesn't, because it goes back to what made me lose my faith in the first place - if God existed (exists), the same God who got so involved in human history around the time of Moses, of Jesus, and other periods in history - a God who seemed so ready to involve himself in human evolution - then where the heck was he during Pope Urban's call to slaughter countless numbers of His children? Where was He when the Spaniard exterminated whole races of indigenous peoples in Central and South America?

Where was God when, at the moment I was most vulnerable in my beliefs, all I got was rebukes and lectures? The God I was raised to believe in is supposed to be omnipotent and omnipresent. All it would take would be the right words from this "man of the cloth" I sought advice from.

I've had this discussion with some Catholic friends of mine (I try to avoid religious discussions when I can, but it's come up a few times in the past 15 years). Their standard response is "God was testing you, and you failed".

Bullshit. That's not the God I was raised to believe in. That's not the God I read about. The God I was taught about was supposed to be my Father. My Savior. My Advisor. My Friend when I'm in need. When all else failed, I was taught I could count on Him. That day I realized it was all a scam.

Today, I'm not sorry about it. I'm not sad, I'm not in despair. I'm reflective, and I have my own inner beliefs that might be just as powerful as a God. Beliefs I don't talk to anyone about, even Jean, because they are just for me only. But I cannot believe there is a God, nor do I believe that Jesus Christ was his Son. Blasphemous, I know, but history (something, by the way, recorded mainly by Catholics) has taught me this. Maybe one day I will change, but at one point, I thought that if something like what the Pope did today happened, I would regain my faith. Now that it has happened, I still find I cannot reconcile my former faith with what I believe to be true today.

Till next time, thanks for stopping by....

2 comments | reply

Mixelania

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