Catholics are making it up.

I wonder what would be more foolish; religions that never change regardless of any reasoning or thought or mores or one that has found the need to change over time and has done so.Many of the facets of religions are trappings that are far from the essence or central tenets of faith. I see here that at least one Protestant holds the view that such a statement does not apply to their circumstance, but that view is nonsense. Protestantism is full of stuff that is primarily traditional and completely non essential to Christianity. Fortunately, you can usually find one or more churches that does without the baggage you find in another church.Catholicism is far older than many religious sects and has accumulated far more ancient baggage. Much of the baggage represents reasons why people decide to be or not to be Catholics. I see absolutely no problem with attempts to shed some of that baggage as needed.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Is an abandoned doctrine really any kind of indictment? Is everything somebody believed some kind of inviolate truth? Do we really think less of Protestants because they are no longer doing witch hunts? Do we think less of Southern Baptists because they no longer claim that slavery has Biblical support? I certainly don't. People believed things for what they considered good reasons. Different people disagree and are in a position to make changes and have.Most of the excess baggage of religion are things that are adopted for people and not because God requires them. If some stuff isn't working or if further thought shows that it does not make sense, the stuff ought to be dropped. It is your choice what to believe and what not to believe regardless of what those leaders do. Besides, haven't you already made your decision regarding what you believe?

I know I promised not to respond to you, but wow, is your understanding way off. It's almost as though we never discussed witch executions in these fora before.Somehow a one time execution of witches in the United states occurred over a period extending from 1647 to 1692 in two different states. Here is a list of executions in the US from which you can glean the information yourself.http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/ESPYyear.pdfAnd if slavery is not a Biblical tenet, then it can be held in the same regard as Limbo. On the other hand, there are verses in the Bible that do justify slavery and some Protestants certainly did justify holding slaves using the Bible. How in the world you can justify some superior position of Protestantism on sticking to true doctrine by labeling slavery a not 'Biblical tenet' is beyond me.Did you know that the Southern Baptist Church apologized for supporting slavery in 1995, which was 25 years after Mormons removed their racists views from official church doctrine?No Christian church is perfect. They all endorse stuff that is somewhere between difficult to impossible to support Biblically. But nobody is much better than fundamentalists at picking out claiming the Biblical high road for their own brand of dogma.I could make similar comments regarding Mormons and polygamy, but I'm sure most people can construct the argument for themselves.Edited by NoNukes, : Change possessives to plurals.

Lol! Yeah, but who cares? The doctrine under indictment has abandoned.We abandon scientific ideas that turn out to be wrong, but that's no indictment of science as a whole, and it certainly s no indictment of the state of science after abandoning an old idea that seemed to work. The failure of Newton's theory of gravitation is no indictment of science or of Newton, for that matter.The plumb pudding model of the atom was abandoned for a Bohr model which was itself abandoned for a quantum mechanical model. Nobody thinks the less of physics because of that progression.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Really? You find some surprise that people accept that the Pope is not perfect even with respect to knowing what God wants? Do you expect that people worship the Pope? Popes change but their opinions and beliefs must not? Yes, the argument is serious. I want to know why for you the abandonment of the plumb pudding model as completely wrong headed is not worthy of the same ridicule as the abandonment of Limbo? Why is it reasonable not to question the entire scientific edifice when a strongly held idea is discarded.There is nothing inherently wrong with abandoning an idea that turns out to be wrong regardless of how long it was held or how preciously it was respected. Yes, we should question why a wrong headed belief was held for so long, but the mere fact that things have changed is alone no indictment of the current state.

Perhaps the humor in repeatedly mucking around with my handle will wear out in time. I had assumed the first time was a mere error, but evidently I was mistaken. Changing because people don't believe him anymore or even at a whim is your characterization; a characterization for which you offer no evidence and scant argument. According to you there is no legitimate way for theological doctrine to change or be reinterpreted by others. You state that as fact when instead it is simply your unsupported position.The pope did not change his mind. A new person became pope.

The Original Sin - About Catholics

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Catholic Beliefs and Catholic Teachings

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Adam’s choice to disobey God and eat from the tree in the middle of the garden, after Eve was tempted by the serpent, demonstrated what is at the essence of all sin: that sin is rooted in man’s preference for himself over God. Instead of choosing God, Adam chose himself by eating of the fruit of the tree so that he could be like God, (Genesis 3:5). Humanity was forever changed through this event, losing its innocence of good and evil, bringing sin into the world.

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Original sin is not a committed sin, but rather a contracted sin. Unlike all other sins, which are acts of one’s own personal sin, it is a state of the soul, representing the fallen nature that was handed on to us by Adam who fell into death upon committing the original sin. It represents the fallen state of humanity in which we find ourselves devoid of the original grace and holiness with which humanity was created,

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Scientists and science branches that behave in this way are rightly criticized. I think this argument is the wrong approach.Tangle has expressed the idea that religious doctrines must be nothing short of the absolute truth at all times. He also leaves no room for any legitimate way for religion to progress towards truth. In my view, both prepositions are simply preposterous standards to set for any human endeavor and I reject them out of hand absent an argument to the contrary. I would not be so quick to assume that statement to be correct. But isn't it beside the point? We don't condemn all of physics simply because, for example, Einstein was resistant to quantum mechanics, or because his peers were reluctant to let go of Galilean time-space concepts. But there is also no need to elevate poor behavior either.

Religious people of one ilk or the other may make such claims, but the claims are often bogus. Among the people who consider themselves to be Christians, many of the details of belief vary quite widely.The stuff Tangle points to is so far from the center beliefs of Christianity that uncertainty about it is understandable. Individuals make their own calls about much of the peripheral stuff like which day is the Sabbath, which day to celebrate Christmas, whether limbo exists, etc. And in many cases they can cite scriptural bases for their decisions.And of course every man made decision or interpretation is subject to further review. I don't see any distinction in that regard between science and theology. The entire distinction is the complete dismissal of philosophy and theology as a pursuit by at least the atheists making the argument that religion should never change.The consequences are different of course. For most people, the fact that some new esoteric scientific foundation is only tentative is of little impact on their lives. On the other hand, decisions about theology might well have daily impacts on the lives of believers.

Actually your claim is that there is something nefarious or wrong with that. In particular you claim that the change is to maintain popularity rather than due to any legitimate analysis. In fact, you assert that there is no basis for any such legitimate growth. I'm just wondering if you are ever going to get around to making an argument.

Your claims are what you've already said which turns out not to be completely consistent with your summarizing remarks. And your claim is incorrect. Christian belief is derived from the description of Jesus as found in the New Testament. There are some fairly substantial lessons that can be cleaned from that on which there is substantial agreement, and then other things that can be drawn from that upon which people might disagree. None of that is purely suggestive.What exactly does the Bible say about whether divorces can be forgiven? Is it so clear cut that two people in different eras reading the material would necessarily reach the same conclusion. Divorce is frowned upon, but do people who divorce go to hell? I personally doubt it, and FWIW don't really care what the Catholic Church or the pope opine on the issue anyway. Sure. Only if that same process happened in science we would both consider it to be an improvement. We might evaluate why people accepted the previous wrong stuff even tentatively, but we would not throw out the process.Again, your reasons for distinguishing between what is acceptable progress in science and theology are seem to be simply a disregard for theology and nothing more. The disregard is what I expect. . My claims are what I have said they are. Your arguments are paper thin and tell us more about you than they do the Catholic Church.

The point of comparison is a single one. Why it is that theology cannot legitimately change. Except that large numbers of them do agree for the most part. About other parts there is disagreement. As people change, the areas of disagreement may change without having to make up anything. And it is the accusation that changes represent the Catholic Church simply making up things that is the central accusation in the OP.

Except that beliefs are instead what we understand the word of God to be, and sometimes those beliefs are incorrect or only approximations based on our human limits. Further, people change, their circumstances change, and both their understanding and the applicability of what they are reading changes. I can imagine in a situation where possessions are unnecessary and commandments not to steal have no meaning except as a way of understanding the people of the past. The Pope is the head of the Catholic Church. What he says about church doctrine is the last word on the subject just as the US Supreme Court's decisions are the final word on constitutionality.And of course different Popes say different things based on, I assume, what they themselves believe. There are all kinds of reasons why one Pope might see things differently than another.The Supreme Court says that gays can marry, and they reach that conclusion using the same constitution under which gay marriage rights were not supported. Does that make the constitution a sham given that it has not been amended in way relevant to the issue of gay marriage since 1865? Not as I see it.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Yes, in exactly the way that people who read a scientific textbook and try to interpret its meaning are 'making it up'. Your use of the term 'making it up' is decidedly non-standard.

Is any of it made up by the Catholic Church or by the current pope? If not then the example is not supportive of the OP.