How held back is Ireland due to the Catholic Church?

**bernadette** · 03-08-2012, 03:31 PM

Originally Posted by Captain Con O'Sullivan

Probably one of the most savage debates in the early church. If I recall my reading correctly I believe there were a number of schools of thought and many rejected the notion of a trinity. There then followed some absolutely horrific incidents such as beheadings of dissenting priests in their own churches in some cases by those who insisted on the official Triad position.

Amazing stuff went on in the early days and after the first councils of that cult.

However bloody it was those in favour of keeping the trinity were right, they would not get mass support without it. Its in every country they invaded aspects of the home religion are appropriated into christianity.

Irelands sacred mountain, not easy to overlook or bypass. Not a problem its taken over and is even more sacred.....I actually don't like calling it by its formal name. A) its the wrong name and B) Patrick was not the first holy person up the mountain! So irritating. I prefer the Reek.

**Captain Con O'Sullivan** · 03-08-2012, 05:42 PM

A fellow called Lanciani (Rodolfo Amadeo) was the head honcho in Rome for the latter part of the 19th century when it came to excavations and archaeological digs in that city. He wrote beautifully on many of the discoveries made on various digs through the layers of that city and in fact his maps of ancient Rome are still the accepted standard among archaeologists and historical cartographers for the period between the 'drui' or old religions and christianity as it built over that fascinating era.

He was a practising Roman Catholic himself and his writings are scholarly and you can see where he felt something of a crisis between his unwillligness to criticise the church and the dedicated scientist in him. He refers at one point to the replacement and destruction of drui shrines and statuary as an 'exquisite vandalism'.

References; a translation of his 'Pagan and Christian Rome (1896) (online at LacusCurtius)
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/...NARD/home.html

I think this book is available free on Kindle as well. Recommended both for subject and style... wikipedia on Lanciani http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodolfo_Lanciani

**Trow** · 03-08-2012, 07:49 PM

Originally Posted by toxic avenger

I don't think I'll engage in any more Catholicism-related threads here - it's kind of depressing to see the same mutual congratulations and people falling over themselves to vociferously agree with each other (even with views that are clear and open hate-speech).

There's no argument from me against the proposition that the behaviour of parts of the Church hierarchy in Ireland and some other countries has been outrageous, nor against the proposition that people like Cardinal Brady should be defrocked and charged. But there is no recognition at all of the great priests who do heroic work (and always have done) in Ireland and all around the world (and expect little or no thanks or recognition for it), nor is there any attempt to even admit the possibility that the Church has played any positive role at all in Ireland over the centuries. Instead there is just a litany of slogans, lazy assumptions, and a clinging to the new establishment narratives (yes, that's right, you're not being rebellious and clever, you're just part of the dominant establishment consensus, as incapable of truly independent thought as us Catholics are ritually accused of being).

It is quite apparent that it's just me against everyone else every time, which was a nice challenge for a while but got tedious very quickly as there doesn't seem to be anyone who is prepared to believe anything good about anyone or anything to do with Catholicism (that involves a truly independent mind and an ability to challenge the cosy dominant narrative bubble).

There is simply no attempt at balance or objectivity at all, just hysteria - to the point that no-one bothers to question (even when I point it out) someone's suggestion that Catholic priests are the equivalent of the SS.

So I'll leave you all to vociferously agree that all Catholics are superstitious peasant idiots led by a hierarchy that consists 100% of paedophiles or their accomplices, that Catholicism has been nothing but unmitigated evil and has resulted in absolutely zero help for Ireland and the Irish, and that we're all sooo much cleverer and trendier than them all. Well done us.

Enjoy the mutual backclapping, and sorry to have pissed on the parade at all...

You should'nt take it so personal.