Given all the crimes committed by Catholicism in the Middle Ages, why does anyone still affiliate with it?

Question

Didn't it reveal a very real ability to be the opposite of "good"?

Answer 1

Given all the atrocities committed by humans throughout history, why does anyone still affiliate with us?

Answer 2

I understand your feelings about Catholicism. However people still affiliate with it due to the fact that they are born into it and raised in a tradition of Catholicism. The Catholic religion is strong in tradition and that tradition has a way of becoming a habit in peoples lives. They may not necessarily believe but they follow. After all the famous catholic saying is that this is what the church believes and this is what I believe. These people do not follow the teachings of the church but still believe they are Catholics. Another reason is that when the **** hits the fan and you need an exorcism or some serious blessings, people are asking for a priest, not a Rabbi or Protestant preacher.

Answer 3

For openers, I wasn't alive in the Middle Ages. I wasn't there, and it would be foolish of me to wallow in guilt for things that happened centuries before I was born (although I do, of course, agree that some of these events were profoundly wrong). If you think that the Roman Catholic Church was the only entity capable of evil during that historical period, I suggest that you re-read medieval history. Many churches, cultures, and social groups have done wrong in the past. It doesn't mean that these groups should be banned forever; it just means that they need to be reformed in some way.

I am a modern-day Catholic. I have never burned a witch (and in fact, have many Pagan friends). I don't torture non-Catholics, and have never launched an Inquisition. And neither has my local church.

Answer 4

Hardly limited to Catholicism I think. Anglicans and Puritans conducted the witch burnings and hangings in Britain and the colonies.

The key question in my mind comes down to the notion of regeneration and indwelling of the Holy Spirit. I've looked very hard for decades for some measurable difference between Christians and non-Christians that indicates one is indwelt by an all powerful deity who conforms them to the image of Christ and guides them into all truth. It's just words. There is absolutely nothing about Christians that is unique. And in the case of fundamentalists it's pure pietism and cultural triumphalism. At least with Catholics I know they seem to retain a sense of awe and humility about their faith.

Answer 5

By that same logic, who would want to be considered German given the acts of the Nazi's? Or going back further, the Germanic tribes?

Who would want to be the monarch of England given with previous monarches have done?

Who would want to keep their name, knowing that their great great grandparents owned slaves and treated them terribly?

You cannot and should not forget the past, but the sins of those several centuries before us do not reflect upon the state of things today. Yes, the Catholic Church committed some heinous acts in its almost 2000 year history, but that doesn't mean that the church today does the same. And yes, I denounce those who act in un-Christlike ways (thinking of certain priests) but that doesn't mean there aren't good Catholics.

Answer 6

Given all the crimes committed by __________ in the _________, why does anyone still affiliate with it.

Why don't you understand you could label almost any group with any crime sometime in History.
The question is are they still practicing it!
A lot of people need to have a wider view on life and groups of people otherwise we are in for a lot of trouble as you grow up!

Answer 7

Given each and all the crimes committed by way of the Atheist international places (communist) interior the twentieth century, why does all people nonetheless associate with it? Timothy McVight believed that he replaced into status up for American freedoms while he blew up the Federal construction. yet we don't abandon freedom because of the fact one guy or woman abused the theory. maximum all people is clever adequate to cut up the actuality of a faith or a philosophy from the abuse of it by way of a few of its followers. what's usually no longer indexed interior the form of wars prevented by way of the Catholic church because of the fact of Papel mediation between the events. what's usually no longer stated is the works of charity and sacrifice which helped to save multitudes while famine or ailment threatened to wipe out entire populations. what's usually no longer stated is that the church replaced into the only source that save literature, music, historic previous, and education alive for the duration of the darkish a while. what isn't stated is how many hundreds of thousands of lives have been saved by way of the church while it prevented the Muslims for persevering with their war to exterminate all of Africa and Europe.

Answer 8

It comes down to people being able to split apart their thoughts on the Church from those of its leaders. The fact that said leaders tend to invent and choose the doctrine that the flock follows seems to have been forgotten along the line.

This being said, these crimes of which you speak...were people to abandon organized religions for these, we'd have very little left in the way of organized religions.

Answer 9

Because that was hundreds of years ago, because it was the result of people as opposed to the church, because much of it was political rather than religious, because for all the bad committed by individual Catholics, the church itself has done a great deal of good.

Should we avoid interaction with everything and everyone who has done some ill in the past? I guess we'd all be hermits.

Answer 10

Because even the Church can evolve (oops!). What I mean to say is that I don't feel responsible for what my ancestors do--in the church or otherwise. If the teachings of the church can help me live my life better, I'm all for it. (BTW, I'm Lutheran, but the same holds for Lutheranism--Luther was embarassingly anti-semitic--doesn't mean I have to be.)