Habemus Papam!

... which is Latin for "We have a Pope!"
So, what can I add to the dialogue being the non-catholic that I am? Here's my take.
"Liberal Catholics"... walk away. This is a simple thing to understand and it applies to all of the world's religions.
The job of any religion is to dispense the revelation of god to the people. Now, we might all argue over who or what God is, but the fact is, if you believe in an eternal creator of the universe, HE WILL NOT CHANGE. HE CANNOT CHANGE. He is ALREADY eternal, and sufficiently powerful enough to create all that there is. How is is that you can believe in any god and then believe it is HIS job to change to serve YOUR needs?

What ever version of "truth" you subscribe to, truth was not handed down by said god lightly. He is omniscient. He is omnipresent. He foresaw that human beings would begin to apply a sliding scale to morality and he laid down the law to combat that. (At the minimum) 6000 years ago, the God of the Abraham was NOT unaware of the concept of practice of homosexuality. He, in fact, DEALT with the issue and said "Man shall not lie with man". If you cannot live with that decree, you are not obedient to the God of Abraham. (Which includes Christians [including catholics, orthodox and protestants], Jews and Muslims). It's really simple. He won't change his mind simply because we as a society have become comfortable with Homosexuality. He called it a moral wrong. If you are a Child of Abraham, it continues to be a moral wrong. If you do not consider it a moral wrong, you are not a Child of Abraham. You do not believe in THAT god. You may say "but interpretations change". They do. But there is no "interpretation" of that scripture that is going to allow the church to embrace gays. [EDIT] This is a poor choice of words on my part. Many churches do embrace homosexuals. I am talking specifically about the Abrahamic Faiths and their stance on the homosexual lifestyle. Now, the idea that priests cannot marry is extra biblical, but if the Catholic church were to turn on ideas like homosexuality, divorce, and core issues like that, it will only be shortly before it's demise. It is when doctrine swings in the wind that the religious institutions of the world will cease to be relevant.

Now, you may be arrogant enough to believe that you alone on the earth are enlightened, and that you can figure out your own cosmology. I can't get there. I think that a faith fundementally must be something larger than my own ego or intellect. However, if you are so very sure that you have it all figured out, you can just forego the comfort of the "church".

And yet the very large majority of us, sinners though we be, seek the comfort of a religious institution. Why is that? With all that has happened since the Enlightenment project began, why does man still long for God? I believe it is instinct.
We know that there something larger than us. Something that science cannot explain away. And I don't expect that He will conform himself to my image. I don't think you should expect it either.
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And that's enough for now.

Brian Norwood

Platypi Design