NopePope!

[smokingboot]

So are we broke or are we not?

http://www.secularism.org.uk/protests-planned-for-pope-visit.html

I don't want to pay for the pope to visit. Even if he wasn't anti-gay, anti-womens rights, anti-contraception, even if he wasn't the champion of an institution with a conscious policy of keeping mankind in in servile ignorance for hundreds of years, while I would never stop him coming to Britain, I see no reason to pay for him. Cos apparently, we have no money. He has lots.

Don't get me wrong - I don't think we should be paying for Brenda pick-nose either, or HRH the man who would be tampon - but at least they don't spout. Or if they do, it's not (excuse the pun) treated as gospel. I'm not discriminating against him particularly - I would feel the same of any iman who wanted to talk about forcing women behind the veil, any hindu who suggested that suttee was a fine idea, any buddhist who claimed that Gautama was perfect because he was neither crippled, nor a woman*. I'm all for free speech. You can say what you want to say, let me pay what I want to pay - absolutely nothing.

*I've come across every single one of these views, this last in a very sacred and respected gompah in Nepal. The major religions of the world really don't like girls.

Comments

[cat-that-walks.livejournal.com]

A lot of the religions round that time (around 40 CE) were Mystery religions, for example Isis, Demeter, Dyonysus, Orpheus and of course Mithras.
Given how Hellene Palestine was at the time it`s unsurprising Christianity could have started out that way before being corrupted by Paul and the other churchianity leaders. Peter and co especially do not seem to have been in the inner circle given how often they apparantly didn`t understand what Christ was on about.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

There certainly seems to have been a lot of resentment about what Mary knew and they didn't regarding Christ's teachings, pretty much paraphrased as 'Would he have told a woman this, and not told us?'

One can only wonder what shape the teachings of Christ would have taken if they had retained the structure of a mystery religion rather than Paul's vision.

[cat-that-walks.livejournal.com]

At a guess I`d say a lot less structured.