I would assume that any data sales have some sort of written agreement for what the data will be used for. In this case it would be that the people who signed the agreement lied.
> I would assume that any data sales have some sort of written agreement for what the data will be used for
Would you also assume that Grindr would have a privacy policy in the TOS which stipulates this as well? So, data buyer lied and thus made Grindr a liar to you, is Grindr the victim?
At what point do we have to say 'whoops, we got hacked/tricked/sloppy and your data is in the hands of bad guys, our bad' is not gonna fly any more. Shut them down. 1 Billion dollar fine next time Home Mart loses all customer files in a hack or SocialFace sells data to people who cause you to lose your livelihood for being gay.
I agree, fine/prosecute everyone from top to bottom. But you would need to prove that Grindr wasn't doing it's due diligence. (That probably wouldn't be too hard)
Both at the Catholic Church for thinking it's a good idea to snoop into the sexuality of their clergy - it's 2023 ffs, the Lutherans and Old Catholics [1] have shown that gays and women are no threat to spirituality - and at Grindr for not giving the slightest fuck about the safety of their users in a world where simply being gay can and does get people executed.
> The clergy opt in to being part of this abusive sect. Nobody forces them to associate with the church.
The situation particularly with Catholics is a bit more complex than that. A number of Catholic clergy originate from young boys raised in strongly religious families who discover they're gay and go into clergydom after they finish school in the (vain) hope that God may lessen their sexual desires.
They're not forced into church by conventional means, but rather by brainwashing.
> If they don't like the treatment they receive at a job, they can quit. Having abusive and discriminatory bosses is a great reason to GTFO.
Employment conditions outside of the church aren't great. Your choice is either a different faith (such as Old Catholicism) or academia.
Leaving abusive and discriminatory bosses is certainly a good idea, but it doesn't mean that we can't be outraged by the actions of abusive and discriminatory bosses.
And this is why privacy matters, even if you think you have nothing to hide. There's no telling what someone else is going to have a problem with, no way to know if the data being sold about you is accurate or how it will be used against you, and no way to remove whatever data is out there or keep others from weaponizing it.
They went after sexual orientation this time, but the next time some group makes headlines because they decide to take advantage of the pervasive surveillance we all live under, it could just as easily be targeting our political views, our religion, our hobbies, our ancestry, our medial conditions, etc. More and more often people are going to buy up, collect, or steal data on whoever they don't like so they can subject them to harassment/abuse/violence/discrimination.
There's a multi-billion dollar a year industry around the buying and selling of even the most mundane aspects of our lives and it's sure not just for "ads".
> And this is why privacy matters, even if you think you have nothing to hide.
While I agree in principle, this is a bad example. They are homosexuals who are members of a homophobe group, obviously they do have something to hide.
Most of these priests probably did feel they had something to hide, but my point was that even those of us who feel we don't are just as vulnerable as these priests since it's impossible to know what might prejudice someone against you.
Since we're all being tracked and associated with an endlessly growing set of data points, with no assurance of accuracy, who knows what criteria could get your name pulled and added to the next group's hitlist?
But "I have nothing to hide" will the lazy and also righteous ones always say (until it hits them). And even if really true for their own small lives, not understanding that this is like a responsibility for the common cause and not their individual position, so everybody should actually care...
>Between 2017 and early 2020, Grindr was selling precise location data to ad brokers.
Well, that's quite scummy. Tends to enable bad actors in the first place.
In January 2016, Grindr announced that it had sold a 60% stake in the company for $93 million to a Chinese video game development firm, Kunlun Tech Co Ltd (formerly Beijing Kunlun Tech Co Ltd). In January 2018, Kunlun purchased the remainder of the company for $152 million. [0]
Wasn't exactly the best steward for such a platform. [1][3[4]
But hey, at least the founder feels bad about it. [2]
I was about to suggest that something which amounts to a giant blackmail database is surely a significant national security risk, and further research indicates that it actually changed hands again for that reason. [3][4]
Selling data on your users sounds like a pretty average move for tech startups though, the connection to "they did it because China discriminates against LGBT" is pretty far-fetched, especially since they still had a minority position when that was happening.
I expect they would've done the same if it had been a SF company that would've bought 60% of it in 2016.
>... "they did it because China discriminates against LGBT" is pretty far-fetched ...
I agree; that's not what I was trying to say, and I'm sure the primary motivator was money.
You're correct, other dating apps did and still do sell data. [0]
The point I was trying to make is that American consumers are already regarded as barely human from a privacy perspective by our own corporations. It gets worse from there (TikTok), and when you add a certain country's poor LGBTQ human rights record, it's just icing on the cake. By that point they really don't care.
---
Match Group, for all their evil, currently states:
Match Group does not sell the personal information of our users to any third party. [1]
Then in the next paragraph:
In particular, we do NOT use sensitive data, such as sexual orientation, racial or ethnic origins, religion, or precise geolocation data for advertising. [1]
I like the "precise" part. Sounds like selling personal information to me, but I'm not a lawyer.
But... but... they're catholic priests, they not only have a vote of celibacy but they also consider it a sin to have sex outside marriage! Why would a catholic priest use a Dating App?
Religion is a joke...
As an atheist I think anyone, including catholic priests, straight, gay or otherwise, can love or have sex or whatever they want to do with whoever they want to (as long as it's a consenting adult of course), but I'd say for them it's a bit of a cognitive dissonance, as it's supposed to go against their core beliefs, they're not just catholic, they became priests...
I find the whole thing extremely hypocritical though, trying to uncover gay priests on the one hand, which is wrong because they have a right to privacy, and then the Catholic Church protected and just moved somewhere else to pedophile priests who abused children instead of bringing them to justice.
Not sure why you got downvoted. As a Catholic, I've upvoted this. Its perfectly fair, and important, to call out hypocrisy. The church does done some things to address the abuse issue, but clearly it is woefully insufficient. We in the church should be concentrating on loving God and loving our neighbour, whatever their personal beliefs, orientation etc.
Where is the hypocrisy? This is a private Catholic organization trying to expose individual priests & by extension, the Church. Just as lay Catholics exposed child abusing priests & the Church. Once again, it’s lay Catholics trying to clean up degeneracy the Church has turned a blind eye to. This being the case, wouldn’t that make you the hypocrite for taking issue with one & not the other?
If a religion condemns homosexuality.. And you are homosexual.. Why would you want to subscribe to that religion ?
Even more baffling to me, why would you want to be a preacher of that set of ideas ?
I'm not religious.. I prefer the religious institutions be allowed to be as bigoted as is their nature, they must be allowed to show their true colors, so that people can see them for what they are and avoid them more readily.
Personally, as a Catholic, I really don't think God is very interested whether people are gay or straight, as long as their relationships are based on mutual love and respect, and commitment rather than people "using" each other. I don't believe the Catholic church condemns homosexuality per se, rather, there are some high profile vociferous condemners of homosexuality in the church. Unfortunately some of these are saying this ultra-conservative stuff to hide the fact they're actually abusers. People thought that about Cardinal Pell, we may never know the truth. The problem with religion is.... people! Look at most of the world's religions, both great and terrible things are done in the name of them.... There are some great people in the Catholic church, that's what keeps me there. There are also sadly some not-so-great people and certainly the church has lost a lot fo moral authority having failed to address its own internal failings particularly abuse
Or they are completely faithless & degenerate & go into the priesthood knowing it will provide them cover & opportunity to indulge in depravity. That explanation is just as valid as yours mildly closer to the truth.
I disagree with your using of the term "degenerate" to describe homosexuals, I also disagree with your using the term "depravity" to describe seeking consensual relations through an app, that seems unfounded.
Your logic is strange, if they are completely faithless (like me!), then they see no moral wrong with them being as they are, and so, since they're doing nothing wrong, there is no need for "cover".
As for opportunity, are you suggesting that the prist-population contains an higher than average homosexual non-pedophile men ?
(I assume the pedophiles are not using the app since they have ample supply of choir boys?)
Wouldn't it be easier to have gay sex with men when you aren't a priest, so you don't have to hide it? Your scenario makes no sense. What benefit does a gay priest have to get access to gay sex that isn't 100 times better as not a priest but just an openly gay man?
a relative of mine has a husband who was supposed to join the clergy. He just dropped out of the program and married her. Now he's not a priest but a parochial worker. Might be that it is harder to find straight priests because it is possible to just drop out, marry and live a very respectable life. Now if you drop out and come out as gay well that would be a lot more difficult in that kind of community.
But before becoming priest there is a quite long training program (often 5-6 years). Dropping out of it is quite common.
And even after becoming a priest, they can asked to be relieved for their obligations, including celibacy. But in this case they would have to find an other job.
Er, as a Catholic I'd be inclined to dispute this. I know a few ex-priests. One of whom has been happily married for years. Another became a C of E minister and also got married. Another left the priesthood for 17 yrs then eventually came back. My understanding is, its intended to be a lifelong commitment, but it doesn't always work out. A marriage can be annulled in the church if it is thought that one of both parties failed to fully understand what they were promising to each other or fully enter into the promise being a true commitment. That could be the case with ordaining a priest too. As well as the fact that being a priest is an extremely hard job as well as the celibacy requirement so some people come to the conclusion they are unable to fulfil the role properly.
First, divorce is a one-and-done sin. Someone who finalizes a divorce and confesses it is in a state of grace, much as someone who ate steak last Friday and confessed.it.
Now, a laicized priest is in no sin either, unless he attempts to hold himself out as a priest still. A man with a rescript from the Holy See is typically freed from all obligations of the clerical state, and that can and will often include celibacy, so a laicized priest is perfectly eligible for marriage, and perhaps a really good catch.
I'm not sure where you see disagreement. It's not a personal sin for the priest to be dismissed. See #3, by request. Oh sure, a priest may be dismissed as a penalty, for something he did, namely sins such as abuse, but the dismissal itself is not sinful like procuring a divorce. The OP compared laicization to a divorce, and it's nothing like that at all.
Think of it this way: it's not a crime to go to prison, but one will certainly go to prison as the result of a crime.
"Eighty per cent of priests working at the Vatican are gay, although not necessarily sexually active, it is claimed in the book, In the Closet of the Vatican."
While a bishop could arbitrarily excommunicate them, unless they've committed am obvious sin the Church is not going to invite a PR disaster by kicking out super rich members. This group is free to police only gay priests if that's their prerogative, and it'd still be an independent group using their own money.
I'm not talking about excommunication. Also, that penalty doesn't make an organization "non Catholic".
I'm talking about the Church's right to revoke the term "Catholic" which is not infrequently invoked, for example against RealCatholicTV and the National Catholic Reporter. It's not excommunication, just a representation and naming issue.
And I think the term you want is "financially autonomous" because no Catholic individual or group is "independent" unless they are schismatic.
The Catholic Church, of course, cannot trademark or copyright Catholicism or its doctrine, and so in most locales she has no secular legal standing to restrict the use of the word or term "Catholic".
However, the bishop can and will have a say in which Catholic groups call themselves "Catholic" and represent themselves as Catholic groups within the Catholic Church, and so they have ecclesiastical authority to revoke that right of representation. Not a few groups have abused the honor and privilege of the Catholic name, and it's been revoked.
Now also, whether or not a group chooses to cease calling itself "Catholic" is up to the group entirely, and whether they choose to be obedient. The National Catholic Register notoriously brushed off their bishop's concerns and continues to use the name. Others simply rename to something that doesn't contain that word.
It's also the case that the bishop gets to say who can reserve the Blessed Sacrament, and have it in a chapel where Mass is said. For example, St. Joseph Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix had those privileges revoked, along with their Catholic identity, when they performed an abortion. That identity was later restored by the same bishop who revoked it, so it's all good.
Seems to me its possible the priesthood attracts a disproportionate amount of gay men, in which case , not following the celibacy rule is more commonly happening in gay rather than straight relationships? In which case people trying to catch priests not being celibate are going to find "richer pickings" on gay apps. (Sure its still likely driven by homophobia, and its still a horrible thing to do). Basically, many straight men wouldn't even consider the priesthood as they'd think celibacy is impossible and/or undesirable for them. For gay men I'd think its a different calculation. Historically, and still in many societies today, its been considered "unacceptable" to be gay. Therefore, if you're gay, what are you gonna do if you can't be openingly in a gay relationship? In that case, the priesthood might be a safe haven of sorts either if (a) they have a strong faith, some calling to be a priest, and think celibacy is not asking that much given they cannot openly have the relationships that are natural for them, or (b) its tacitly known that there are other gay men in the priesthood, and there are underground relationships going on. As a Catholic, I've met priest(s) that I'd be unsurprised to hear were gay, although, no suggestion they weren't being celibate, and its of no-one else's business IMHO (judge not lest thy be judged). I also heard a story of someone who went to Rome to train to be a priest then left in disgust when basically propositioned by men who were also training to be priests. His disgust was not as I understand from homophobia, but rather along the lines that they were basically using the seminary as a place for finding gay partners , rather than training to serve others as priest , in other words their motivation was completely wrong, and they had no apparent intention to follow celibacy.
I guess because pedo priest abusing altar boys makes for worse publicity than priest dating adult woman and it's double sin (since homosexuality ain't allowed besides sex outside marriage).
And another reminder or funfact: apparently a main reason to introduce the obligatory celibate for priests was: "the need to avoid claims on church property by priests' offspring".
Yep, the celibacy is not about sex but about marriage; throughout history it was not that rare for priests to have unofficial spouses and kids, and at some times it wasn't even particularly shunned, but the concept of celibacy ensured that there couldn't be any legitimate kids i.e. heirs.
Also: it is pretty much only the Catholic church that mandates celibacy for priests. The Eastern churches allow married priests, but not bishops - while one tenet of Protestantism is the priesthood of all believers, where everyone should be able to talk with God and play a role in church affairs.
That's a silly generalization. Are you telling me that all the priests I know are wicked renegades, because they maintain loving, close bonds with their parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews and nieces? Ouch, that forbidding is harsh stuff. Wait until their bishop finds out! ...The bishop who visited his family on Christmas.
Also you've ignored and snubbed Ordinariate priests and many Eastern Catholic ones who are happily married with plenty of kids running around the parish.
> Just a reminder that Catholic priests are forbidden to have any family or romantic relationships.
Latin Catholic priests have to be celibate, with rare exceptions (mostly married Protestant clergy who convert to Catholicism). But Eastern Catholic priests (but not bishops) are allowed to be married. Of course, only 1-2% of Catholics are Eastern and the other 98-99% are Latin, which is why people don’t know this
“Any family” is wrong because all Catholic priests are totally allowed to have family relationships with their parents, siblings, nieces/nephews, cousins, etc - just not be married.
Technically a widower with grown children can be ordained a (Latin Catholic) priest-so it isn’t even like children are absolutely impossible-although that’s a rather unlikely scenario in practice (but one I believe actually has happened before)
Their privacy was invaded the minute it was collected and sold by the dating app. The Catholic group that used this data are assholes, but the people collecting, selling, and reselling the data are worse.
Just the bay area had more than 700 lawsuits for child abuse filled against Catholic church employees in the last 3 years, so this catholic group and similar ones maybe should redirect their efforts into outing child molesters first.
Do you actually believe that homosexual men have more access to children than heterosexual men and that they are more prone to pedophilia? Why don't you think about this logically. Even if they overrepresented pedophiles by say 50% compared to hetero men and hetero men are 1% pedophiles, than means as 10% of the population you are looking at 0.5 * 0.1 = = 0.05 = 0.5%. Now say that homosexuals don't usually have access to children like men who have families do, but lets be generous and say that 50% of those men get unsupervised access to children and are practicing child molesters. That makes 0.25% of the population.
Let's compare that to hetero men. At 90% of male population and 1% pedos that makes 0.9% of the population. Now, straight men have easier access to kids because, what do you know, they tend to help make them. So, lets say 75% even on the low side here makes 0.675% of active child molesters.
0.25% of men vs 0.675% of men. You really believe that your stats are correct?
These are all bullshit napkin math but illustrate how this makes no logical sense, even with numbers HIGHLY skewed in your favor.
> biological parents abusing their children is exceedingly rare
Even if one were to accept this as truth, this doesn't preclude them from abusing other children. This is where 'access' comes in. Most men with children are around children because their kids are friends with other kids, etc. Homosexual men generally do not have this access.
At this point you're arguing with someone who has literally just said that all children raised by (e.g.) adoptive parents are victims of child abuse. At least, I do not see how else to interpret "everything else is child abuse".
The poster also has a recent history of pointlessly stirring the pot with regard to LGBT issues, as for example in the following post, where they (by some chain of logic I can't entirely follow) link the collapse of SVB (of all things!) to the fact that some of the people who worked there vocally supported LGBT rights: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35106648 This sort of thing is about, say, two steps removed from blaming gay people for floods and earthquakes.
I share your annoyance at seeing this kind of stuff on HN (a depressingly frequent occurrence), but the comment you're replying to makes such outrageous claims that it is probably better to just leave it here.
I know this person is a lost cause but they aren't shouting into a void -- other people read these threads and in this instance I will not allow highly flawed bigoted argumentation to go unanswered.
The author of the article, Timothy Dailey, is associated with the Family Research Council, which still in 2023 has this on its website: https://www.frc.org/homosexuality
Now, why do you need to go back to an obscure article published over 20 years ago by a homophobic ultraconservative organization to source your claims? Perhaps because the vast majority of experts now believe these claims to be false.
Funny enough a vpn would have hid the service provider, but would have not solved this issue — as some influencers are advertising. It’s the gps data that makes these apps useful (find someone near) that was uses apparently to identify users.
Additionally, with device ID you could probably get other datasets that contain email name etc. That seems like a better route to go than the GPS tracks. But, maybe just having the app wasn’t invasive enough.
Having good enough opsec that you can't be identified just isn't realistic for normal people, we need to ban this stuff. I'm quite disappointed that GDPR seems to have just resulted in the addition of meaningless consent forms to every website
Surely this data would have been sold with some terms of use that might allow remedy through civil action even if the data could 'technically' be used in this manner. That being said it's a clear demonstration of why privacy matters and this is only mid-tier in the list of people you wouldn't want to get this data.
Goto love contract cults. Woman searches for men with reliable anti-gay emotional reaction. Then transfers social power to a contract-cult they bully gay men into, to uphold the one contract they actually care about: marriage | social support aka as a civilizational framework.
Almost 2000 years of stagnation and missery ensue.
Now a new contract cult is in town. Its actually more liberal and less stuck up. It has all the same features of the old, including parades and dogmatic screeching, but a little less violence & enforcing gender norms. All hell breaks loose.
Admitted this contract cult instance has men holding the bag a bit, but still to have the old contract cults go into this "Inquisition" for potential runaway servants is ridiculous.
Also noticeable, this only applies to "bad" times. As long , as there is a surplus for everyone, nobody gives a ** about "morals". Justice is only needed when push comes to shove.
edit: Downvote all you want, the reality of us as a retarded species does not go anywhere fast..
Ahhh. Kind of thought they had, as it seems like a case of (digital) stalking and harassment, clearly targetting a group of people based upon their LGBTQ status and religious affiliation.
Not in all countries. Even though the Tories in the UK are currently very anti-trans, and veering hard-right on immigration, they're not touching gay rights.
Correct; the sexual abuse scandal chiefly involves pederasty, not pedophilia, which is super-rare and occurs with the same rarity among clergy as it does in the general population.
> occurs with the same rarity among clergy as it does in the general population.
While this is true, the issue surrounding the Catholic Church is how the have historically handled it. Often it was covered up, the priest moved to a different parish, and it would just happen again and again with the same offenders. So yes the number offending clergy is roughly the same as the general population but failing to prevent known offenders from inflicting life long damage on innocent children is despicable.
NB: These are just the orphanages in a single Australian State - if you'd care to read the various lengthy Royal Commission reports you can find such abuse by Catholic Priests was widespread across the country.
Yes, it's tragic, and unfortunately, there are homosexual men who seek access to young boys via a "vocation", same as any who would seek access through the foster care system, pediatric medicine, teaching, coaching youth, Boy Scouts. The list is endless. The thing that can be done is organizational vigilance, by making all aware of the signs and methods of reporting, and removing barriers such as shame or retaliation.
> The thing that can be done is organizational vigilance, by making all aware of the signs and methods of reporting, and removing barriers such as shame or retaliation.
Zero chance of that happening when you have second tier (just below Pope) Council of Cardinal Advisers actively covering up pedophile priests and moving them about to fresh stalking grounds with no advice or warning given to the communities.
Again, for details see the various Royal Commission reports.
Please do not minimise this stuff by making false claims about it being "super rare" .. a good 80% of tens of thousands of post war orphans have rapey priest stories.
Perhaps you're confused (like many attorneys and reporters) about the distinction between "coverups" and carefully maintaining utter confidentiality among victims, families, and those who are sometimes wrongly accused.
Numerous studies have proven the low, low incidence of true pedophilia. I'm not saying sexual abuse was rare.
I understand the difference between prepubescent and postpubescent and I can read (and have read) both national and state investigations into the Catholic Brothers Institutions here in Australia that took in tens of thousands of post WWII children and sexually, physically and emotionally abused a considerable percentage of those children both pre and post pubescent.
Perhaps you might read these specific reports rather than some airy compilation of "numerous reports".
The trust fund operated for three years. It made lump-sum payments to 127 men for child sexual abuse.
Perhaps you're confused about the documented extent of the actual decades of industrial scale child abuse perpetrated by Catholics at post war orphanages globally? (Canada, Australia, South Africa, etc).
Perhaps you're confused because you've never looked into the details?
Customs officer: G'day, passport please.
Man, immigrating to Australia: Cheers.
Customs officer: Anything to declare?
Man: no, sir.
Customs: Do you have a criminal record we should know about?
Man: BUGGER! I didn't realise that one is still required here!
What does their being homosexual have to do with their being paedophiles? Homosexuals aren't by default attracted to boys. I am straight and I am attracted to women, not girls.
I’m not saying this to justify what this group did - I’m sure the vast majority of adult men on Grindr have zero intention of pursuing the minors on the platform, and if they happen to make contact with one, will do the right thing once they find out they are a minor. I’m sure many of these priests had no such intention either.
I agree that its fraudulent. Its a mess though, right? Why would it be more fraudulent for a priest to be having a gay relationship than a straight sexual relationship? Because its a "double sin"? I'm really uncomfortable with that, sounds like homophobia. Find a new line of work? Well I kind of agree but who are the rest of us, who haven't promised to be celibate, to say that or judge? Had I been called to be a priest I think I'd have failed at the celibacy requirement. ;) And anyway the church hasn't always required celibacy, in fact it currently lets married C of E minister join under the ordinariate. I do agree with you these priests are being fraudulent, and possibly should indeed find another line of work but on the other hand why target specifically gay-related issues, seems hard to disentangle from homophobia, and the motivation of those who outed them does not seem kind or loving or following Catholic values
I don't think this will come as a surprise but God doesn't endorse homosexuality. Quite the opposite. God loves everyone, including gay people. He does not love sin. It is perfectly in line with Catholic values to weed out sin in all of its forms.
(It wasn't me that downvoted you BTW). It seems to me, God is interested about whether people are being kind and loving to each other, working for peace , avoiding wars, making sure everyone is fed, housed, clothed, educated, respected etc. This includes ensuring people aren't abused or exploited by others, which unfortunately has happened within the church and has a long way to go to be fixed. When it comes to what takes place sexually between consenting adults, absolutely there are morals in that area, but it seems to me it is humans who have become obsessed with that area of morality at the expense of other areas of life. When there are millions upon millions of people that have become refugees as result of wars, famines, floods etc, surely don't you think God is rather more bothered by that? And, doesn't that mean, humans should be most bothered by that. And Catholics should be working to fix that, rather than wasting time on trivialities? I do not condone priests for pretending to be celibate while seeking gay sex, also if they joined the priesthood with the precise intention of finding sex (gay or for that matter straight although the latter is an unlikely reason) rather than serving others, then that's very bad. However... really... in the big scheme of things.. shouldn't we be first and foremost caring about helping the marginalised and vulnerable. Perhaps the wealthy people that outed those gay priests, might have done better helping refugees instead? I'd imagine that's what God would've preferred.
I understand what you mean but homosexuality is not a trivial matter in Christianity, to God, to the Catholic church, or to adherents of the faith. It's one of the big ones. Outing homosexual priests does not exclude the people doing the outing from also working to address other issues, should they have the resources and the inclination. All other important aspects of the religion don't fall to the wayside because there are hungry people in the world. The poor will always be with us.
Do you really feel that, if one takes homosexuality to be wrong, its really a big deal to God, compared to people starving or lacking basic medical care while others are rich, or people shooting at each other? Also, why do people make such a big deal about gay sex being wrong, when far more people, including many Catholics , are having sex outside of marriage which is equally against the teaching of the church? What is "specially bad" about gay sex in that context? To me, it'd be a cruel God that creates people who find themselves to be gay and then condemns them for being something they did not choose for themselves. It seems to me, since God is caring and merciful, he must make allowances. Which leads me to question the church's official teaching on homosexuality. I have friends in both camps BTW - friends and colleagues that are gay, and Catholic friends who lean towards traditional/conservative. At least 90% of married Catholics use contraception, so there must be a lot of devout Catholics who have decided the church has got it wrong on that rule for example. It is such a mess. A friend years ago wrestled with this as he came from a traditional Catholic upbringing and then discovered he was gay. I think it comes back to "judge not lest thy be judged".
Its a fair question :) My understanding is that the vengeful angry God described in parts of the Old Testament reflects the only partial understanding of God by humans at the time that was written. When bad things happened like plagues etc, people assumed that was God punishing people. Later, Jesus spent much time clarifying this and trying to put things straight in people's minds, that in fact God is not vengeful at all but loving and merciful. And by allowing himself to be crucified, Jesus demonstrated that by a powerful action. It is sometimes said that "The Bible is a dangerous book". ;). If you go straight to the Old Testament you may indeed get a terrible impression of God and be turned off christianity for life. Also, some churches build their whole faith on this and go around judging and berating people. One good thing about the Catholic church is it has traditions based on 2000 yrs of theologians studying the bible and trying to make sense of it, so , theoretically , a better understanding should be able to be found by looking at some Catholic teaching than by going straight to the bible. On the other hand, humans are fallible, so there are certainly plenty of Catholics who misunderstand the what the church believe, there is stuff that is still debated within the church or even incoherent still, there are people in the church for the wrong reasons, e:g either using it as a gay dating agency having made a solemn promise to be celibate, or trying to use it to target gays that they hate. (to return to the original subject of this debate :) ) Cos people can sometimes be... well, assholes is a strong word... perhaps, not as kind as they should be would be a better way of putting it.
Does that mean we nullify the Ten Commandments, or are those still 'the word of God'? Have you read them and thought about them? They are basically three major things:
1. Pay attention to God, a lot, and don't make him jealous
2. Uphold patriarchy
3. Don't murder/steal/lie*
None of those things are 'loving', and the only true absolutes (the ones God doesn't revoke when he gets a bit pissed and commands followers to smite whole people's for offending him somehow) are the 'worship God' and 'uphold patriarchy' parts.
Jesus was a Great PR guy, but for everything he did to make the big guy look good, he still ended up getting tortured to death for lulz and never got Daddy's love (why hast thou forsaken me?).
Honestly a true reading of God is a sadistic narcissist and it makes the most sense. If an omnipotent being actually cared about us he wouldn't give a bunch of conflicting information all the time and watch us hurt each other and let babies die of AIDS...and he damn sure wouldn't have tortured his own kid to death.
Ok this is going off-topic and getting complicated, but I'll try to give a helpful response. :) First of all, if you're looking at the bible and trying to understand where Christians are coming from, (or make sense of our apparently nonsensical religion, if you want to look at it like that ;) ), if I were you I'd forget about the Old Testament for now and look at the New Testament first. Going direct to the Old Testament, without the benefit of anyone knowledgeable to explain it, whether a sensible person from within a church or by reading some decent theology books, is likely to give you all sorts of inaccurate notions about God. The idea that he smites people down and calls others to do so, is an example. It seems to say that in the Old Testament, because, as I said, the authors lacked full understanding, but later Jesus cleared this up. Of course its a problem that there are some Christians today who believe precisely that, because they too have a messed up understanding IMHO. Which is why the Catholic church despite its many faults has something better - 2000 yrs of attempting to think about this. As for God letting us do bad stuff to each other and babies dying of AIDS etc, these are valid Qs and extremely difficult to answer. Many Christians wrestle with these till their dying day. The failure to be able to answer them easily doesn't in itself invalidate the religion though IMHO. If you have no religion, you are left with other. "worse", unanswered Qs e:g what's even the point of our existence. The church teaches that God gives us free will, and that if we follow Jesus' teachings to look after each other everything will be OK. Dealing with cancer, disabilities etc in a world where people look after and devote resources to caring for people in that situation is different from a world where people don't give a ** about others' suffering. Also we are taught that God feels our suffering too, he suffers with us. As for God torturing his own kid to death, Catholics believe in the trinity, that Jesus was God in human form, therefore he suffered himself. It wasn't God that did the torturing, it was humans that did that. He allowed people to do that, in order to "take the hit" , basically accept punishment himself for our failings so that we get to be forgiven. Which is an amazing act of self-sacrifice and a demonstration of how much God actually cares about us. Well, that's what I believe anyway. :). You're welcome to tell me you're sure its complete nonsense. All I would suggest in return is to keep an open mind. :)
Oh, I went to Church every Sunday and I went to Catholic school. I know all this stuff. I am telling you what actually makes sense to me. None of the stuff that Church tradition passes down makes any sense at all unless you look at it from the perspective of Paul. He took a pauper's religion with a dead leader and went around spreading it, completely forming it in his own way in order to cater to spread and politics (no circumcision needed! eat pork, it's fine...).
Basically, The Church == Paul, and Paul never met Jesus.
If you want to say that 'The Old Testament' is 'people's misunderstanding of things back in the day', then you can also say that 'The New Testament' is a do-over with Paul incorporating as much stuff as possible to appeal to the people of his time. Jesus never wrote a word of it.
If anything could be 'from the mouth of God' it is the Old Testament, and it is the only thing that actually seems to have any logic to it. The NT stuff is just nonsense because it all comes down to if God is all powerful then he is CHOOSING not to act in certain ways which make him IMMORAL and therefore God cannot be the basis of a good morality. Take that for what you want, but if you read it with any rationality it has to be that way. Now, if you want to be Christian for all the good things it espouses -- great! But don't try to convince me that it isn't nonsense.
Ok, didn't realise you already came for a Catholic background. :) Well.... I'm not sure where you get that the church == Paul. My understanding was NT was the result of many eye-witnesses, take the gospels for example, 4 authors, right? Paul's letters play a major part that's true. Not sure where the pauper's religion comes from? Never heard that myself. There were rich and poor alike . Joseph of Arimathea was rich wasn't he? I don't see how you justify the claim that OT is "from the mouth of God" more than NT? As for God choosing not to act, what I always understood about that was that humans choosing to be good by their own free will was the ultimate goal, the "holy grail" so to speak. If God intervened when we did bad things then we wouldn't have free will. This must be extremely hard to take if you're in Ukraine right now getting bombed thinking "Come on God why aren't you stopping this". My understanding is, in the context of this life just being a "dress rehearsal" for what is to come after death, that it makes some kind of sense. I heard it said, that trying to work out what God is up to is for us like watching someone sewing and looking at all the messy threads on the underneath, with little clue what the end result will be. Someone could be making something amazing, but if all you ever see along the way is a mess of threads, you could question that they're making anything at all, then one day, there it is in all its glory. Thought experiment for you - would you be happier in a world where God kept intervening and stopping people being mean to each other? Would that make people be better? Would they have any way of learning to be better to each other if God always stepped in? Alternatively, is building a world one day, presumably not in this world. where humans all decide of their own free will to act justly and kindly to each other, a goal worthy of putting up with a lot of s** with along the way? Granted, if you're on the receiving end of evil in the meantime it must be extremely hard to take, but then we're told God shares that suffering and is present during it.... Basically, it seems to me Christianity throws up all manner of difficult almost impossible Qs but that to me doesn't negate it and I can't really see an alternative viewpoint without even more problems. All the best :)
Thanks for the conversation, but I can't really keep this going because of the format of HN. Feel free to PM me on reddit though (same username). I will leave you with this:
> I'm not sure where you get that the church == Paul
I meant more like, Paul is responsible for the shift from the Jewish bearing to the Gentile one. He preached to the Gentiles and made the religion palatable for them. He got into huge fights with the other Church founders about this, and was treated very harshly by the Jewish authorities who would beat him and kick him out of their towns.
Here is an excerpt from the well regarded 'The Rise of Christianity' by WHC Freund[0] (page 110):
"By 64, however, the new religious movement had taken root.
Without detracting from the work of Peter, John, and the other disciples in
the decade following the crucifixion, the credit belongs to Paul. Jesus was
indeed the very ground of his being, but Paul had never experienced Jesus’
ministry, and his interpretation of it gave Jesus’ message a new and unex¬
pected dimension. He transformed the proclamation of God’s kingdom to
“the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt. 15:24) into a world move¬
ment. Despite all handicaps, Paul judged precisely the prevailing mood of
very many fellow Dispersion Jews. The Galatians, as we have seen, re¬
ceived him with rapture (Gal. 4:14). On the mainland of Europe the Chris¬
tians of Philippi were devoted to him. He offered a religion which, though
basically Jewish, was stripped of the encumbrances of the Mosaic Law and
its Pharisaic interpretations, a religion that had sufficient in common with
Stoic ethics and the worship of the mystery cults to attract adherents on the
outer fringes of the synagogue and even beyond. The ideal of a community
in which there was neither bond nor free, Jew nor Greek, but which was
united through love in a Savior (cf. Gal. 5:6), and freed thereby from the
Law, the power of fate, and the malevolent astral lords of time, could also
become the ideal of many of the inhabitants of the Greco-Roman world.
The Savior whom Paul preached was not a savior god of current pagan
myth but a historical figure invested with deity."
I would be completely unsurprised if there were more than a few chaste clerics on these dating apps, and they were fully (secretly) authorized to use the clandestine social networks to provide compassionate ministry to LGBTQ and HIV-positive individuals, and "outing" them completely destroys their ability to serve where they are most needed.
It would be a lot more fun if we could make similar jokes about pedophilia in the Muslim and Jewish communities - where it's arguably far more widespread and tolerated.
Infuriated by these anti-LGBTQ vigilantes! How dare they use the data we sold them which included their locations and device ID and app usage!
What a joke...