fayfreethinkers.com

WHEN Times editors assigned me to the religion beat, I believed God had answered my prayers.

As a serious Christian, I had cringed at some of the coverage in the mainstream media. Faith frequently was treated like a circus, even a freak show.

I wanted to report objectively and respectfully about how belief shapes people's lives. Along the way, I believed, my own faith would grow deeper and sturdier.

But during the eight years I covered religion, something very different happened.

Read the rest here. Very powerful.

Poor fellow never managed to separate god from religion. Perhaps I should say spirituality from religion. Religion is one more power structure. It exists to perpetuate itself, as with any other corporeal/bureaucratic entity. It's original purpose is secondary at best. That's why it's useless to quote scripture to the religious. They are either living it or they aren't and what, if any, religion they may or may not follow is immaterial.

Sherry here, not James. I'm just typing under his account.

I feel really bad for the author of the article, I truly do. His investigations of organized religion and their associated crimes simply broke his heart. You know, I've been an atheist my entire life. I NEVER believed any of it. I ALWAYS thought it was 100% grade-A prime horseshit. Because I was never in love with anybody's god, because I was never immersed in religiosity . . . well, I couldn't be disappointed in an unrequited-love sort of way. The author of the article, however, has been disillusioned in a highly personal, hurtful manner - and I feel quite sorry for him. Of course, there are worse crimes such as the ongoing Catholic sex scandals, or the fleecing of poverty-stricken shut-ins who send their last dollars to some slick televangelist - but hearing a decent man describe how he lost his cherry to, and then got kicked in the spiritual nuts by religion is pretty horrible, too. Witnessing the loss of innocence - knowing that it can never be gotten back - is no fun. Poor guy.

Sherry - I absolutely agree. The religion I was brought up in basically followed the "do no harm" tenent and the basic prayer was "Divine order" - so even though I was a catholic in my 30s (I have recovered), the fundies were never able to get to me with their pseudo fellowship and altar calls and all that. I've never personally known a catholic priest who was a pedophile, but I did know a methodist youth director who was. The catholics have a saying, "the devil rides outside monestary walls" - sometimes, unfortunately, they let him in - all religions, not just RC - I don't know what it is about the "religious life" that seems to draw those. But I do feel sorry for anybody, like that young man, who has their illusions shattered so nastily.

Barbara Fitzpatrick wrote:Sherry - I absolutely agree. The religion I was brought up in basically followed the "do no harm" tenent and the basic prayer was "Divine order" - so even though I was a catholic in my 30s (I have recovered), the fundies were never able to get to me with their pseudo fellowship and altar calls and all that. I've never personally known a catholic priest who was a pedophile, but I did know a methodist youth director who was. The catholics have a saying, "the devil rides outside monestary walls" - sometimes, unfortunately, they let him in - all religions, not just RC - I don't know what it is about the "religious life" that seems to draw those. But I do feel sorry for anybody, like that young man, who has their illusions shattered so nastily.

DOUG
a. I have known at least a couple of pedophile priests, in South Texas. I have even known three or four of the boys one of them went after.
b. Many nonbelievers who become so by loss of faith report that they are very depressed--at first. It may take a year or two, but in all cases I've heard of, the nonbeliever then experiences a great joy at having cast off the yolk of superstition. It's like a divorce or some other life-changing event. It may hurt at first, but the rewards make up for it later.

Doug - I wasn't trying to suggest that there are no pedophilic priests - I just haven't personally known any. I do think the focus on RC pedophiles is just as unbalanced as Muslim=terrorist - not all, or even most, RC priests are pedophiles. That's just as much anti-catholic propaganda as the (unfortunately often believed by fundies) story that RC priests performed satanic rites which included having sex with all the nuns at whatever convents they visited (and the resulting babies are buried in the convent gardens). I also think those guilty should be punished as severely as any other "trusted family member" pedophile - and, yes, the Bishops who knew about it and looked the other way should also be punished, be it by significant fine or whatever.

It's the loss of innocence, the betrayal of trust, that is so painful - both to feel and to watch. That can happen with a divorce, but doesn't necessarily have to - usually the divorce happens long after the realization of loss. A person may or may not get over it, even if they feel happier out of the situation.