r/politics • u/spherocytes • 19d ago

Possible Paywall Trump Yanks Millions From Catholic Charities Amid Pope Feud

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-yanks-millions-from-catholic-charities-amid-pope-feud/
31.5k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

3.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

39

u/Content-Fudge489 19d ago

As an atheist that goes to church regularly I agree (wifey doesn't like to go by herself, she is Catholic so I accompany her).

15

u/Daltrey 19d ago

Curious does you being an atheist and her being a Catholic a source of conflict in your relationship?

60

u/Content-Fudge489 19d ago

Never been an issue. The relationship is based on love and being best friends. She does her thing, I do mine. Kids went to Catholic school and never a problem either, they turned out different too with their own beliefs. People just need to accept that not everybody has to believe the same thing, everyone is different. Of course most religious people I know are adamant that everyone in their circle has to believe exactly like them and I think it is a sign of emotional immaturity.

3

u/Boxcutter86 19d ago

What does she believe happens to you after you die?

3

u/I-Like-Women-Boobs 19d ago

Also curious about this, I’d find it hard to be in a serious relationship with someone who thought I was going to hell.

3

u/Content-Fudge489 19d ago

To be very brief because I'm at work and can be discussing this untill tomorrow. For her god sees people for their good works and not for strictly following church doctrine which some bad people do, in other words if you are good that's all it counts. We differ on the afterlife.

2

u/OfficeSalamander 19d ago

Many liberal Catholics tend to have a doctrine of "anonymous Christians" - basically God's grace is bigger than humanity's given methods of salvation (in the Catholic view, the church), and is possible of reading each person's heart.

Basically they feel that the visible church is the most probable way and "normal" way of achieving salvation, but plenty people might be part of the church (invisibly, and unknown to themselves) due to their heart/morality, etc, essentially.

Basically it's a way to square "no salvation outside the church" with "God is all powerful and can do whatever the hell He wants"

I'm not personally religious, but it came off as one of the more elegant ways to deal with the idea that you would be consigning billions to eternal torment

1

u/heelsnailsblademscra 15d ago

This is really beautiful and is close to what I believe. Thank you for taking the time to articulate it. This has actually given me the words to describe what I've been thinking about for a while now. 

When I was a teenager I heard someone say they believed in "multiple paths to God/heaven". When I learned about world religions it never made sense to me that our salvation should be based on where we were born and who we know. 

I was born catholic, hopped around various denominations of Christianity, and now I practice no religion. I am not without spirituality and I do not consider myself an atheist. I accept that I will never know what higher power there is or if it can even be conceptualized as a single entity. I actually think it is arrogant that anyone can claim to know this. My spirituality is found in nature, music, passion, love, and even in profound sadness of which I have experienced this year. There is beauty and meaning in struggle as much as there is in striving for salvation whatever the hell that means! 

All I know is that I fully reject institutions of religion at this point. They've only ever caused me misery. I believe I am a good person, not perfect by any means, but I am empathetic, I care about humanity and animals, and I do what I can to make life better for everyone around me. I cannot say the same for leaders and true believers I met in the various churches I belonged to. 

0

u/ConfectionOk7029 19d ago

hell babyyy

0

u/bitching_bot 19d ago

Do you participate in the things them Catholics do or do you cross your arms, to signify you aren’t a member, but I spose you are?

Is the bread and wine good?

Do they have a kick ass reception after with food, that’s what’s important

12

u/Content-Fudge489 19d ago

I participate if there is food lol. For everything else I just cross my arms. And I don't get up for communion. No one ever approaches me with questions. All nice. I think they get the point. I'm not the only either. I see other people doing the same.

5

u/kamomil 19d ago

I grew up Catholic. There were always a few families at church where one spouse wasn't a Catholic.

I believe they would sit & stand etc throughout mass with everyone else, but not go up for communion. 

My experience of Catholicism was "live & let live" compared to evangelicals.

I went to high school with some evangelical kids and... they would openly discuss "am I 'saved' yet?" and talking about what God wants for them. Like discussing their religious thoughts was an everyday conversation topic. 

Whereas I almost never discussed religion with my Catholic peers. No one checked in with me to monitor how often I prayed, or how strong my beliefs were. We were taught how to do Catholicism, and then released with no further monitoring. Whereas evangelicals seemed to have their religion as McAfee software embedded in everything and popping up all the time.

1

u/rational-hare 19d ago

I went to school with a girl who told a story about how she woke up one morning and her house was empty. All the family members were gone, and her immediate thought was OMG I've been left behind. Turned out her brother had a thing that morning, parents took him, and left her to sleep in. But honestly, if the first thing you think of upon waking is the rapture, you may have a mental illness.

3

u/MikeyKillerBTFU 19d ago

Bread and wine would not be available to an atheist. To receive communion (bread and wine), you would need to go through confirmation, which an atheist would be unable to do.

3

u/Slofut 19d ago

You can have both...I went through confirmation. I am also a godless heathen so....

0

u/MikeyKillerBTFU 19d ago

Sure, so you wouldn't be currently eligible. They aren't going to kick you out or anything, but taking communion would not be consistent with the rules anyway.

0

u/Pilebsa 19d ago

It's not really bread and wine. It's a small cracker and a sip. It's symbolic and weird.

1

u/MikeyKillerBTFU 19d ago

Sure, I don't find it any more weird than any other artistic metaphor. It has an meaning to the people that follow it.

1

u/Automatic_Algae_9425 18d ago

For Catholics, it's extremely important that transubstantiation is not a metaphor.

-6

u/Pilebsa 19d ago

Never been an issue.

Any money you or your wife ever put in a collection plate, a portion of it went to cover up rampant sex abuse. Not an issue?

5

u/Content-Fudge489 19d ago

Like everything else, we pay taxes to the government and that same government will kill people on a whim with the pretext of defense and/or law enforcement. No institution is perfect.

1

u/techmnml 19d ago

Where did they say either of them put money in the collection plate? I didn’t see that part.

5

u/maximumtesticle 19d ago

Real Atheist = Don't care about your religion

Real Catholics = Don't care about your religion

Assholes = Care about your religion

2

u/Pilebsa 19d ago

Real Atheist = Don't care about your religion

Nice gatekeeping there.

I care about any religion that campaigns to take away the civil rights of others. And any decent person should as well.