I hear the word humility. A lot. In all honesty it doesn't look that way to me. It looks like political practicality. Is he humble inside his heart? Who knows? It's too early to discern what power will do to him.

I do know this, it is illogical to claim humility while claiming infallibility. Please think about that. That's a clear oxymoron. Of course, this new pope isn't claiming to be humble, is he? Everyone is putting that label onto him. I wonder why?

Faith is seeing things as you want to see them, rather than understanding reality as it actually may be. Just more evidence of the cognitive illness that it is.

Let's just hope that he "corrupts" the Curia with his ways instead of the Curia corrupting him. He's going to be a lot more isolated now. No more bus rides to work. Traveling in the "Pope Mobile" for protection. I just hope he doesn't become depressed by his "confinement".

It sounds to me atheist, that you just looke to criticize and disagree with every single point and aspect of the goings on of us "religious folk" without really taking the time to consider anything. Not very mature, and transparently bitter for some injustice you must have suffered personally. I sympathize with you, but I wish you would be a little more practical.

be sure not to turn against god just because of what we see a mere man doing. God desires all of us, even you atheist. Let not a man or a religion make us turn from our god.

Atheist - Please educate yourself and do a simple search for the Term "Papal Infallibility". It only applies to a very specific set of circumstances. There are a number of Popes who have even denied it (please be open-minded enough to go beyond wikipedia)

That said, I do agree. False humility is one of the most dangerous things a person can be. Nobody can really know if you are humble in your heart. Falsely humble people probably don't know they are falsely humble.

Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen

It is all good to be humble . But in this world Italy is responsible for his safety when he leaves the Vatican and it might be more humble to accept their decision on how best to protect him in their country. It is their country after all. Traffic in Rome can be a nightmare so if they prefer to fly him to Castel Gondolfo I think he should be humble and acquiesce. Remember John Paul II was shot in St Peter's square a jointly protected area that both the Vatican and the city of Rome claim. Nobody wants to say they failed to protect the Pope. The Swiss Guards will lay down their lives for him he needs to remember that and not make the protection detali more dangerous.

FreeSpeeche

Infallibility only applies to a specific set of circumstances? That sentence is your defense? So he's only a little bit infallible? How humble!

Think.

@Atheist - It is my understanding that the Papacy is infallible not the person. I think you are being contrary just to be contrary.

I'm not defending anything, I'm speaking the truth. I was asking you to humble yourself enough to do research on what the true stance is. Be open-minded. I can see by the emptiness of your response that you did not research anything.

He's not giving himself the infallibility, doctrine gives it to the papacy. (I did agree with you that we can't know if he is humble or not - but time will tell)

Think? One of history's greatest thinkers provided insight on the matter of papal infallibility - see Thomas Aquinas. Do some research, and then think.

I doubt that you are as happy as your initial statement claims, and though I know better, I am glad that you left the church.

Atheist- how many times in the last year did you utter "OMG" in one form or another? Just curious.

Hello folks, this mortal man who is just another human has a checkered past.

Don't let anyone kid you the Vatican is worth at a minimum hundreds of billions of dollars. The new Pope Moe Lester in charge will live in the lavish gold encrusted opulence that is the Vatican.

"Former Cardinal and Pope-elect “Francis I”, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, is accused of helping kidnap opponents of Argentina’s military junta during the 1970′s “Dirty War”, and of baby trafficking, by lawyers and members of the Plaza de Mayo human rights group. (Los Angeles Times, April 17, 2005, “Argentine Cardinal Named in Kidnapping Lawsuit”,http://articles.latimes.com/2005/apr/17/world/fg-cardinal17

"General Jorge Rafael Videla and some of his military and police cohorts were convicted by their country’s courts of the murder of 31 people between April and October 1976, a small fraction of the killings they were responsible for. What one did not hear from any senior member of the Argentine hierarchy was any expression of regret for the church’s collaboration and in these crimes. The extent of the church’s complicity in the dark deeds was excellently set out by Horacio Verbitsky, one of Argentina’s most notable journalists, in his book El Silencio (Silence). He recounts how the Argentine navy with the connivance of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, now the Jesuit archbishop of Buenos Aires, hid from a visiting delegation of the Inter-American Human Rights Commission the dictatorship’s political prisoners. Bergoglio was hiding them in nothing less than his holiday home in an island called El Silencio in the River Plate. The most shaming thing for the church is that in such circumstances Bergoglio’s name was allowed to go forward in the ballot to chose the successor of John Paul II. What scandal would not have ensued if the first pope ever to be elected from the continent of America had been revealed as an accessory to murder and false imprisonment."

Hello folks, some things never change. Here's the new boss same as the old boss!

What other organization can continue to operate after it is caught raping children over and over again. WalMart couldn't continue to sell rakes if they did the same thing. What are they going to say, sorry folks we had a little problem in aisle 3 in the children's half pants off sale but everything is ok now! They would be shut down in a heart beat!

Pedophile priests have molested innocent children in the Roman Catholic Church probably since the beginning of the church. These pedophiles have been protected and their horrendous crimes against children have gone unpunished. It is amazing to me that there are over a billion Catholics. I guess acceptance of pedophilia in the church is the cost of "salvation" aye!

Come on, wake up, the Vatican just this week paid out another 10 million in the LA diocese to victims to cover up their pedophiles. In 2007 they paid 660 Million in the same diocese. This is going on all around the globe.

These heinous crimes continue because good people don't speak up and allow the bad people to continue their crimes against humanity.

Not any longer, that is why you see so many people speaking out saying enough is enough. Those that continue to support these crimes after all the evidence are complicit and will suffer the same Karmic repercussions.

The sexual abuse that has been perpetrated by the Catholic Church on tens of thousands of innocent children is on a scale that lends itself so that even the casual observer has to wonder if it is an accepted ritual within the church. Many people come to the defense of the church stating that it is the celibate role that has lent itself to the wide spread abuse. If so, why are the majority of victims boys?

I agree with you 100% on EVERYTHING you said. But...putting all these aside, I was wondering about all the OPULENCE about the life of the POPE. When I was in my early TEENS.....during my early CATHOLIC teachings....I was told (Or CONVINCED)........that the POPE took the place of JESUS CHRIST here on earth.

If you read about the life of CHRIST.....HE lived a SPARTAN life. In other words......HE lived a life of POVERTY. HE was dressed very POORLY, didn't have anyone helping HIM make up his bed, or PREPARE his MEALS.........CHRIST even said..."MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD". And....from what I am reading about this POPE.......He is ALLOWED all the LUXURIES of a VERY WEALTHY lifestyle!

And in my CATHOLIC TEACHINGS........THE POPE IS SUPPOSED TO TAKE THE PLACE OF JESUS CHRIST here in earth!!.....Something's WRONG here!! It makes me wonder.....are THESE CATHOLIC leaders.....A BUNCH of EARTHLY SMUCKS.......WHO JUST ADORE the THINGS of this WORLD?

No WONDER.....they are just like US.....and probably WORSE or MORE DEVILISH........than we are!

gyfs and freespeeche,

Thanks for the replies.

Profreedom, I say OMG all the time and a few other things. I even say Jesus but lately, just Jeebus! How many times do you say the days of the week (also named after extinct gods)? What you witnessed right there is called a cancellation in math. Or something that usually preceeds a facepalm visual in forums like these.

Care to try again?

lulz

somebody copy and paste this so athiest can read...

athiest i sincerely doubt you were ever catholic, i think your just another athiest with an agenda, you have very little knowledge of the faith, which is a clue. i doubt youve ever read one page of the ccc.

the pope is only infallible in regards to doctrine of the faith. did you know the pope goes to confession more often than 98% of catholics?

your not very good at this are you?

For all I see in most of these comments, most of you people are non-believers and don't like to see anything of any good anywhere and in anything. I think you guys need to get some pshycological help for yourselves. All you see is bad and negativity. It is depressing to read you guys' stuff.

Charol Shakeshaft, the Hofstra University scholar who prepared the report,
said the number of abuse cases—which range from unwanted sexual comments to
rape—could be much higher.

"So we think the Catholic Church has a problem?" she told industry newspaper
Education Week in a March 10 interview.

To support her contention, Shakeshaft compared the priest abuse data with
data collected in a national survey for the American Association of University
Women Educational Foundation in 2000. Extrapolating data from the latter, she
estimated roughly 290,000 students experienced some sort of physical sexual
abuse by a school employee from a single decade—1991-2000. That compares with
about five decades of cases of abusive priests.

Such figures led her to contend "the physical sexual abuse of students in
schools is likely more than 100 times the abuse by priests."

Truman, I grew up in the Republic of Ireland and the hate you speak of is terrible-make no mistake about that.

Truman--hate equates with JEALOUSY. People who hate -Fear ,are jealous of something the people have and they don't. I am 66 years old and I have seen this all my life. I know a few people who came from Ireland [I am Irish] and alot of the hate [they tell me] is fear that the haters have is that the hated groupp has something they don't. The Catholics now have a leader that they have faith will bring them back from their problems they have faced that Benedict didn't fix.

This kind of reminds me of what's happening now with our political situation. The Republicans are hating the Democrats because they have something the Republicans want--THE WHITEHOUSE. So the hate has begun and they now are fearing Obama may get done what they wanted to do [get the country back to prosperity] and it will cause them further loses and division in their party.

Btw- I am Irish -Catholic and a Democrat, you know, the kind the Republicans hate....

Truman my best friends father came to the US running from your people that hate went both ways.

Truman, you speak of your father and what he thought. You tell us you now understand his hate. You seem to be a wonderful example of how bigotry is passed from father to son. I suspect virtually every person here can think back to some person they know that had a parent that hated (fill in the blank) and passed that same hatred on to their children. No basis in fact, just bigotry.

As a Catholic, I have to agree with you. I think the media follows this because they are hoping for failure. They do not care about the faith.

I'm not Catholic but... he's not a local leader. He's the religious leader to roughly 1 billion people. That's more than the population of all but a handful of countries. Using your reason the media should not report on most countries elections.

They Publish this because it generates A LOT of comments. When you comment, you reload the page and they get more ad impressions - generating more revenue for them (especially since MSN needs it, for all the money it is spending marketing a failing search engine)

Nobody would read and comment on articles about local authorities - so there is nothing in it for the publisher.

Articles like this bring out more than just Christians. They bring out a lot of Christian bashers, so the target audience is quite large. Bottom line - they make more money.

Hey Rick we did not ask 4000 people to request media credentials. They asked the Vatican City State for credentials. I did not watch your secular coverage because it is banal and incomplete with no understanding of what is happening. As far as I am concerned at least 2000 of thse media pukes could have stayed home.

We contradict one another. I find it unreasonable to accept claims based on zero evidence or even plausibility. What skepticism recognizes is when something is unknown, it is accepted as unknown. Scientific naturalism is about probability, plausibility, not proof.

Faith is the arrogant position if you want to claim arrogance: it provides answers (sometimes very detailed ones) rather than waiting for the evidence. Oftentimes these answers are beyond reproach or discussion. In other words, where skepticism says, "I don't know, faith comes in and says I KNOW, I KNOW!"

It is delusional to believe the stories of ancient faiths. People don't rise after rotting. Alchemy doesn't work: water into wine. Virgin mammals don't have babies. These are facts that can be fact checked. Faith is not falsifiable. Fail.

I am astonished you miss this important distinction. Who taught you to think that way?

All those things you describe of course do not usually happen - but God, who is all powerful, can sometimes change the rules of the game - it is then called a miracle...

Also, faith doesn't say "I KNOW" - faith says "I do not know - but I BELIEVE"

maciej,

Very good! Good catch! Indeed, there is a distinction betwen knowledge and belief. Fair enough. The problem is people of faith still use their beliefs as if it was factual knowledge. They don't just sit around quietly in mental exercises harming nobody. It is the serious problem when imaginings intersect with reality: real people get hurt.

In the past, believing in witches was benign when confined to the imagination but KILLING them was a real consequence that put real people to death. Do you see the danger here when belief is used as the excuse for action? It has a terrible history.

Voltaire said it best centuries ago: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.

Please, please, reflect on this wisdom.

Athiest, that is like saying, a few hundred people choke eating dinner every year in the US, so we should all refrain from eating after 5:00 PM. Your not being logical or reasonable, something I thought atheists pride themselves on.

Atheist:

Much of what you wrote doesn't make sense to me. For example, you claimed (in so many words) that you were Catholic, but now you don't believe in God because of the church's past episodes of misbehavior. I had to scratch my head and wonder what one thing has to do with the other? In other words, if your belief in God were not like a house built on sand, you'd join a different church or distance yourself from ORGANIZED religion altogether while still maintaining your belief in God. See what I mean? Your thought process equates to a non sequitur, i.e., SOME OFFICIALS in my church covered-up episodes of sinful misbehavior, so I don't believe in God anymore. That's an illogical train of thought.

My belief in God has NOTHING to do with any churches, ancient scriptures, or the musings of televangelists. Instead, my belief in God is rooted in science, philosophy, logic, and common sense. While the existence of God cannot be proven scientifically in a laboratory, there are enough clues to conclude that God exists beyond a reasonable doubt. For example, the existence of God is clearly indicated by an honest examination of the Argument from Design, two Laws of Thermodynamics, the Law of Cause and Effect, the Law of Biogenesis, clues from the Fossil Record, the Existence of Conscience, and the Wisdom of the Ages. These arguments collectively provide enough of a starting point to rightly conclude that a Higher Being of some kind exists.

And since you are a lover of quotes from historical icons, ponder these:

Albert Einstein, whose religious beliefs were somewhat enigmatic, nevertheless wrote: “Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe – a spirit vastly superior to that of man…In this way the pursuit of science leads to a religious feeling of a special sort, which is indeed quite different from the religiosity of someone more naive.” He was a bit more succinct when he also said, “The more I study science the more I believe in God.”

Louis Pasteur apparently agrees with Einstein, but with a slightly different twist. Pasteur once quipped, “A little bit of science averts people from God, a lot of it takes us back to Him.”

Carl, no. Atheism has a very simple, short definition: lack of a belief in gods/supernatural. There is nothing in the defintion about atheists are those who show pride in logic and reason. Do you understand?

While many atheists I know are rational people (as are the 93% of atheist in the National Academy of Sciences), there is no rule in the definition that says atheists must be logical or reasonable. I'm sure there are atheists who believe in homeopathy, chiropractic and other goofy things.

Atheist:

YOU WROTE: "While many atheists I know are rational people (as are the 93% of atheist in the National Academy of Sciences)..."

MY RESPONSE: Maybe you should examine this partial list of history’s leading scientists who happen to be Christian: Kepler, Galileo, Brahe, Descartes, Boyle, Copernicus, Newton, Leibniz, Gassendi, Pascal, Mersenne, Cuvier, Harvey, Dalton, Faraday, Herschel, Joule, Lyell, Lavoisier, Priestley, Kelvin, Ohm, Ampere, Steno, Pasteur, Maxwell, Planck, Lemaitre, and Mendel. A good number of these scientists were clergymen; Gassendi and Mersenne were priests. So was Georges Lemaitre, a Belgian astronomer who first proposed the “Big Bang” theory for the origin of the universe. Gregor Mendel, who discovered the principles of heredity, spent his entire adult life as a monk in an Augustinian monastery. Where would modern science be without the wisdom of these historical icons? Some were Protestant and some were Catholic, but all saw their scientific vocation in distinctly Christian terms.

For the record, I'm a Deist. I believe in God, but I am not affiliated with any particular church. Nevertheless, I often do admire the good works that organized religions perform, such as establishing food banks for the poor, running homeless shelters, providing free counseling for various addictions, maintaining worldwide charitable organizations (I'm told that Catholic Charities is one of the largest charities in the entire world; you WERE once Catholic, weren't you?), and doing volunteer labor for the elderly. I've seen various charitable works performed in my own neighborhood by various religious groups, and I was very impressed. I'm just not a fan of their religious rites, ceremonies, and certain doctrines.

dear atheist

both on withes and slavery (from our earlier discussion) - please ponder the fact, that Christians didn't invent neither slavery nor the persecution of witches; both things existed long, long before Jesus Christ was born - but it was the Western civilization, which was shaped mostly and essentially by Christianity, that abolished and eliminated those two things (and in the same time none other, non-Christian culture, never did such a thing...)

Please, please ponder this

It seems atheist have very little acceptance of anothers beliefs. I have seen nothing but total contradiction to almost every single post. It just amazes me.

please ponder the fact, that Christians didn't invent neither slavery nor the persecution of witches; both things existed long, long before Jesus Christ was born - but it was the Western civilization, which was shaped mostly and essentially by Christianity, that abolished and eliminated those two things (and in the same time none other, non-Christian culture, never did such a thing...)

First off, Christianity existed for almost 1900 years before witch hunts and slavery were abolished. Witch hunts were almost entirely a development of christianity. And western society was mostly shaped by Lockean principles, NOT christianity.

Lastly, slavery was rare if not non-existent in hunter gatherer "pagan" tribes.

Rhonda,

Spot on. Exactly my response. Just because you don't agree with the organized religion, doesn't mean you should give up the faith entirely. Religion is just a way of making people feel like they belong to something and it tells you HOW you need to worship God which I have a real problem with considering that it is PEOPLE who are really telling you how to worship rather than God directly. And when you see these people committing unspeakable crimes I can see how it can make you lose faith in the religion, but not in God himself, because after all, they're humans just like us, not saints. They will get what they deserved (I believe in karma).

For the record, I would probably consider myself more agnostic because I feel that's how all scientists are, being a scientist. No real scientist will say something is not possible when the 'impossible' happens. You keep your mind open to new possibilities as you gather new evidence. I consider myself a life scientist, and observe the things around me and try to formulate my own explanations. Like Einstein, my evidence points to something greater than the rest of us. I don't believe it's a stereotypical God in human form in flowing white robes because to me that sounds egotistical and a ploy to make God more approachable and likable. But these are my beliefs. I respect other people's faiths even if I don't agree.

Athiest, what you described in your first post above is known as "Dogma", not faith. Dogma is the thing that is beyond reproach. Dogma is the thing that turns faith into zealotry. It is Dogma that states that The Church is infallible. It is Dogma that feeds the arrogance of the church leadership. Dogma is the thing that plagues The Church, and makes it unable to change as our understanding of the universe changes.

Faith has never been the problem. Faith, at its simplest, is just belief in a higher power or purpose, that there is a sense of order and reason to the universe as we know it.

I separated from The Church a long time ago, because all they teach is hatred, intolerance, and strict obedience to The Church. In that, I agree with you that they have become the very evil from which they claim to be saving the world.

But one does not need to bow down to The Church in order to have faith, nor to believe in God or other higher power. If you choose to not believe in any sort of higher power, that is your choice and your right. However, you seem to be unable to distinguish between people of faith, and The Church.

You verbally attack us, and blame us for everything The Church does, even when The Church does things without our knowledge or consent, and even when The Church does not speak for us.

Until you stop seeing people of faith as "The Enemy", you will never gain the support of us people who have faith in a higher power, *and* see Science as the means to gain understanding.

We in the Catholic Church do not fear science. We invented the scientific method. We study Plato and Aristotle and require it for seminary training, priesthood. We believe when you have your answers we will be waiting for you. We only ask that you do not rashly apply that which you learn before studing what the effect on mankind will be in the long run. Most of the real problems today are caused by too quickly applying science without a full understanding of its ramifications. For example you pushed contraceptives for forty years and now the World Health organization has declared ALL those pills a group 1 carcinogen. The people affected cannot go back and not take the pills and even if they stop today their cancer rates will be higher than the norm for 10 years after they stop. But to this day doctors do not tell their patients about the dangers of the pills. You pushed the idea that population explosion was going to destroy the world well you had better go back and check out demographicbomb.com to see what you have actually created. We ask you to think before you do.

Stephen, I think I agree with others (and not with you on this point) that faith is the license that religious people give themselves to keep believing something when reasons fail.

I never, ever verbally attack people personally on this forum. Ever. If I have failed somewhere, point it out. I would immediately apologize. I do walk a fine line sometimes, I agree. But I do follow TOU in forums I enter.

What I do is attack ideas and peoples' actions (or lack thereof in the case of the Silent Catholic Majority that isn't doing squat about child rape coverups) and while I may say that peoples' claims are delusional, etc., that is different from saying the people are delusional. Understand?

Look, I don't know anyone on this forum. I only know what is written. I attack words. If people are offended, then perhaps they are from Saudi Arabia, the Vatican, or another theocracy where offending the sentimentalities of people warrant cutting off arms or jail time. This is the USA. People don't have a right to not be offended in this country.

My suggestion? Formulate better ideas. The way I see it, bad ideas EXIST to be destroyed. In my experience, people who complain, as you do, are really telling people like me to shut up. Sorry, you don't have that authority over me.

So we must tolerate your right to not believe, okay, you are an AMerican citizen with the same rights as anyone else. Why is it atheists are so intolerant and full of venom towards believers? It is as though you are trying to "convert" people to your way of thinking or dare I say it religion, through condemnation of what others believe and fierce cynicism. Where is the tolerance you wish to recieve towards others who have a different opinion than you do?

If there were no God, there would be no atheists. ~ G. K. Chesterton

Rhonda, I agree with that quote. It's logical. But not for the reasons Chesterton hoped for. Don't get me wrong, he was an astute thinker. His quote just isn't weighty enought to present much a challenge.

Rhonda, atheists are bizarrely defined essentailly as something they are not. (Lack of faith holders). Think of it this way, where religion is weak, atheism is weak. Isn't that beautiful?

A lot of atheists I know think it's ridiculous to even accept the label of atheist. I understand the utility of the word. Someday, I bet it won't be common. Why aren't we also called a-leprechaunists? Well, if there was a religion called leprechaunism that tried to get public schools to teach rainbows are maps to gold, then you can bet there would be a hefty population called a-leprechaunists. Starting to make sense now?

Perhaps now you see that Chesterton's quote is an ironic one to pick from. It only validates the goofiness of those who create the environment necessitating a null answer.

Atheist:

Huh?

Rhonda Lucky-296458

If there were no God, there would be no atheists. ~ G. K. Chesterton

We meet again, apparently.

I see your Chesterton and raise you Thomas Jefferson:

My opinion is that there would never have been an infidel, if there had never been a priest. The artificial structures they have built on the purest of all moral systems, for the purpose of deriving from it pence and power, revolts those who think for themselves, and who read in that system only what is really there.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Mrs. Samuel H. Smith, August, 6, 1816

If someone tells you to respect their taboos in the public square, they aren't asking for your tolerance, they are asking for your submission.

Atheist - There is a difference between what somebody asks and what you think they mean. I think that if you tell me to respect your opinion, even though I disagree with it, I am willing to respect that it is your opinion. You have probably heard the phrase "We agree to disagree". That means that each person respects the fact that everyone is able to have their own opinion. That in no way asks for submission.

Atheist it is your atheist groups that demand not ask that all others be invisible in the world. It is your groups that demand every cross and statue be taken down. That teen aged kids be given gag orders not to offend you Midland Texas Jan 2012 and then do not even have the courtesy to show up for the ceremony. It is your groups that have made a moment of silence something to be taken away from others. Believe me most of the time I relish a moment of silence in a world of noise. So who is it trying to make all others submit.

Same logic can easily be reversed. Because you would be asking someone to submit to your wishes as well (those wishes being that they must be accepting of your ideals, or, in most cases, face ridicule). Respect in public places should be especially observed, but again respect shouldnt be confused with acceptance. Also you could say that using the word 'taboo' is imposing your own ideals on us as factual, which is not very respectful, considering dlsharley didnt say anything offensive to your or anyone who doesnt believe in God. Lets practice what we preech m'kay?

Hoosgow,

Many arguments can be reversed. That is a good practice to get into, to more deeply understand the logic.

Unfortunately, I don't see how you persuasively exercised that ability in your response.

dear F. Schrodinger

The wealth of Vatican is evaluated to be around 15 billion USD - that is not even 1/4 of Bill Gates fortune...

Catholic Church charities help daily MILLIONS of people around the world - saying that Church doesn't share its wealth is simply ludicrous.

God bless you and may he help you get rid of your hatred

Overview of Catholic Church work in health care worldwide Posted: Wednesday, February 10, 2010 8:21 pm

On the eve of the World Day of Prayer for the Sick, Fides has published the numbers of health and social care institutions run by the Church worldwide, from the latest Statistical Yearbook of the Church.

They include: 5,378 hospitals with the majority being in America (1,669) and Europe (1,363), 18,088 dispensaries, mostly in America (5,663), Africa (5,373) and Asia (3,532), 521 leprosy colonies distributed mainly in Asia (293) and Africa (186); 15,448 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, mostly in Europe (8,271) and America (3,839); 9,376 orphanages with about one third in Asia (3,367); 11,555 kindergartens, 13,599 marriage counseling centres distributed mostly in Europe (5,919) and America (4,827), 33,146 centers for education or social re-education centres and 10,356 other institutions.

Here is the breakdown by continent:

AFRICA: 1,074 hospitals, 5,373 dispensaries, 186 leprosy colonies, 753 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, 979 orphanages, 1,997 kindergartens, 1,590 marriage counseling centers, 2,947 educational or rehabilitation centres, 1,279 other institutions.

AMERICA: 1,669 hospitals, 5,663 dispensaries, 38 leprosy colonies; 3,839 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, 2,463 orphanages, 3,715 kindergartens, 4,827 marriage counseling centres, 13,652 education or rehabilitation centres, 4,239 other institutions.

ASIA: 1,102 hospitals, 3,532 dispensaries, 293 leprosy, 2,095 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, 3,367 orphanages, 3,211 kindergartens, 969 marriage counseling centres, 5,379 education or rehabilitation centers, 1,870 other institutions.

OCEANIA: 170 hospitals, 573 dispensaries, 1 leprosy colony; 490 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, 87 orphanages, 108 kindergartens, 294 marriage counseling centers, 592 education or rehabilitation centers, 207 other institutions.

EUROPE: 1,363 hospitals, 2,947 dispensaries, 3 leprosy; 8,271 homes for the elderly, chronically ill, and handicapped, 2,480 orphanages, 2,524 kindergartens, 5,919 marriage counseling centres, 10,576 education or rehabilitation centers, 2,761 other institutions.

http://www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=15629

Good for you IslandGypsy, but these religion HATERS are not listening...It is all falling on deaf ears as they are all stuck on one thing-HATRED! May God Bless you and to all the Atheist, have a wonder ful day as well!

maciej,

I dispute the claim that the world is better off with religion, or the Catholicism does so much good. Good will among people is there despite faith, not because of it. The effects of Catholic Teaching in Africa against condom use (AIDS is bad but condoms are worse teaching) is appalling in this day and age.

To that end, I think faith is a net LOSS for humanity. It is a farce to imply that charitable acts will disappear if Catholicism dies. Charitable acts occur across the globe right now that have nothing to do with faith.

Religion is a poison that isn't needed by people of good will.

dear atheist

well, we clearly have a difference of opinions - but once again, appreciating faith from a purely utilitarian point of view, is missing a part of the isue - I sincerely believe that almighty loving God exists and therefore refusing to believe in him is simply a mistake and finding God again after losing the faith is correcting a mistake - and correcting mistakes is always the right thing to do, even if those mistakes which are not immediately life threatening or otherwise dangerous. One should not look in his heart to find God because faith SERVES a utilitarian purpose - but simply because this is the RIGHT THING to do.

Now, that being said those who do not believe in God can be also decent human beings and do considerable good - and in fact I also believe that heaven is full of very surprised atheists (at least those who used to be good people in this life) because a loving God would not damn decent people just for being stubbornly silly

For the same reasons I never claimed that charity would vanish if religion would disappear

On the point that religion is poison, my answer would be that many of the heathen creeds and also almost all the cults founded by false prophets are indeed poison. As for the Christianity (and its Jewish ancestor) well, for me they are like water - life as we know it can not exist without it, but wrongly, abusively or maliciously used, even water kills... In the same way, true religion is like water for the soul - but wrongly used it poisons it...

Best regards

A loving God?? You may have a nice life but the children diddled by dozens of priests have not had it so good. A loving God? the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Cathares?? A loving God? Women continually at the bottom of the social scale? Your blindness and your low expectations of any God have everything to do with a political institution called the Catholic Church but they have nothing to do with love.

Atheist I don't know how old you are but I have been alive and old enough to understand on both sides of the sexual revolution and the developement of contraceptives. I have actually watched the change in society. The developement of contraceptives did not lessen out of wedlock pregnancy it increased it because they fail approximately 1 in 10 times and sexual activity increased more than the pills and condoms could handle. When I was 16 and sexually active there were 2 just 2 sexually transmitted diseases You now due to the increase of sexual activity outside of marriage have between 6 and 12 different STDs. It was around 2% of the population with STDs when I was 16 now it is 25%. So where oh where are the great advances in society from condoms and contraceptives

lonereb,

Your post is very difficult to get a handle on about how to reply. You are setting up not a straw man, but a straw army!

If you want to make a rational case that favors your observations and desires for society then simply make it. But what you can't do, what is made impossible by our Constitution, is to make laws that are based on religious tenets and put the power of public dollars and government authority behind it.

Perhaps the Vatican, Iran, or Yemen will issue you a visa to try your version of reality on their soil.

Stephanie: There are many many GOOD priests in the Catholic Church. Bashing all the priests is dumb.

God bless the Holy Father and good luck for his work! He will need it, as challenges are many...

What a wonderful choice of name! Saint Francis was always one of my favorite saints!

What a wonderful, warm, joyful, blessed and happy moment was the announcement yesterday by cardinal Tauran, who was actually crying from emotion, when he said:

@MacieJ...I agree with everything you said above :)

I must add that I am truly happy that we have a Jesuit Pope. I was raised around Jesuits and so have a "soft spot" for them given how humble and generous they are, at least the ones I have met anyway.

Hatred? It's ok to hate those who cover up child rape. We need more hatred of evil and less turning the other cheek.

I don't know who taught you to not hate evil but shame on them! It's amazing to me, and I depair a bit, to think that I am doing what every moral Catholic should be doing. Rising up and denouncing the global coverup of child rape.

Catholics are far too silent. There are supposedly millions of them. Where is their outrage? They are actually having fundraisers in California specifically designed to help with the legal bills due to the rape scandals.

This is disgraceful. Children need a voice, as an atheist, I am morally bound to never forget them and will help shame horrible policies when I can.

You should be side to side with me!

the difference between you and me is Hatred. I am not here to judge-i do not as I have said one hundred times condone molestation. You are fixated on that one thing....I do hope they are all imprisoned but I do not Hate. I can not and that is the difference between you and me.

Athiests are full of hatred? Wow, that certainly is the pot calling the kettle black. Its unfortunate that people that have to believe in a fairy tale in order to give their pathetic lives some purpose but its even more pathetic that they use that gobbledegook to foster hate and discrimination against groups of people that have never done them any harm.

dear atheist

only a tiny minority of priests harmed children; only a minority of bishops and cardinals mismanaged this question - therefore hating the whole Church, which is an enormous entity with 2000 years of history is somehow overreacting

Atheists are attacked all the time. Their attack is woven into our social and religious systems. Catholicism has caused more death, destruction and genocide than any institution. I see that people need the church because they have turned off their brain. Living is just too hard for them.

They scares me.

You have turned off your brain to logical reason, that is why Atheiists or pugilists(IMHO) are attacked. Whether you are Catholic, Christian, Muslim, Jewish etc., yes there are also OTHER religions (not naming here) who kill on a more recent & regular basis, stating one that was 1500-2000 years ago, usually due to their religious fanatical beliefs. No one in any religion or human should be allowed to do this, and 99.9% Chrsitians & others would agree. But answer one (impossible/implausible) question, how did life start? From a virtiual nothingness? It had to be a incredible "one & only" force that if you research science (or as most Athesist profess by), that everything at the start of "existence/time" was in PERFECT equilibrium. What caused this "unique" chain reaction? Nothing in science can possibly or can answer this. We will know when we do meet the force or God as we call this entity, I believe somewhere in the future perhaps (or maybe not). I would state, that since most religions believe in a "physical/spiritual" God, this being or presence might be in a total another dimension to what we think. But I give the Church kudos to electing a pope that comes from a humble background, and is compassionate for the downtrodden. This was the basis of Christian faith, most disciples/apostles or preachers came from humble backgrounds - shepherds, laborers, stone cutters etc. i.e. poor people. This is a great day for the world, NWS the athesists that spew nonsense & hate.

Stephanie Chastain:

YOU WROTE: "Catholicism has caused more death, destruction and genocide than any institution."

MY RESPONSE: Can you back up such an asinine claim with documentation or do you just spew random nonsense hoping that someone will believe you?

I suggest you grab a copy of the Guinness Book of World Records and turn to the category "Judicial," sub-heading "Crimes: Mass killings." You'll find that carnage of unimaginable proportions resulted not from religion, but from INSTITUTIONALIZED ATHEISM. Guinness reports, "The greatest massacre ever imputed by the government of one sovereign against another is the 26.3 million Chinese killed during the regime of Mao Zedong between 1949 and May 1965 (total of 16 years)."

In addition, Adolf Hitler murdered six million Jews during the holocaust, which was performed for ethnic cleansing and false economics. Hitler was a social Darwinist, slaughtering people who didn't fit his concept of an Aryan master race. That's why he also sent an untold number of gypsies, homosexuals, the mentally impaired, and other "undesirables" to the gas chambers.

In the USSR, Nobel Prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn estimated that state repression and terrorism took over 60 million lives from 1917 to 1959 under Lenin, Stalin, and Khrushchev. However, the worst known per-capita genocide of all time happened in Cambodia under Pol Pot. According to Guinness, "More than one third of the eight million Khmers were killed between April 17, 1975 and January 1979."

Let me add to that mix some other recent atheist rulers who slaughtered vast numbers of people: Kim Il-Sung of North Korea dispatched approximately 1,600,000 people; Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia killed an estimated 1,072,000 people; and Nicolae Ceausescue of Romania put to death 60,000 folks.

The obvious conclusion here is that atheist leaders are far more brutal, sadistic, and savage on a far larger scale than religious folks have ever been. The FACTS speak for themselves...you just have to examine them with an open mind. Otherwise, your ignorance and anti-religion bigotry will continue to cloud your thinking.

Finally, you might want to ponder the words of Will Rogers, who once said, "It's not the things we don't know that gets us into trouble. It's the things we know that just ain't true."

Bran, you really need to read posts from the past 2 days to understand the comment. I do not judge you nor wish condemnation on you and I am a believer in God. For some reason Atheists have this idea that all believers are judging them. I do not. I believe religion (or no religion) is a PERSONAL preference. Tolerence is what we need here. Tolerance of others views. I do tolerate what Atheist 5939529 says and I wish him well but it seems that atheists are on the attack here and that is not tolerance. Not all Catholic people are bad, I for one want to see any priest or cardinal or bishop or whoever that either committed acts of molestation or covered it up to be punished and put in prison. We are hoping now for a chance for that to happen. If they can't be imprisoned then I hope they are stripped of their titles in the church and not be allowed to preform any duties in the church except as a parishioner to ask for forgiveness.

we had a priest here in this area that was convicted of embezzling millions of dollars from a local drug/alchohol program, also convicted of bank/irs fraud. he tried to cover up money by depositing amounts to his bank accounts that would not invite questions from banks and irs.. Drug program did not file complaint because after he was caught, he repaid the money in full cash. His brother was a prominent lawyer in this area as well...as of right now, he has not spent one day in jail.

Saneg that's wondeful that you don't judge/mistreat atheists. Unfortunately, despite what you say, we can't say the same about other believers. Many believers do judge and hurt us.

I was bullied (even physically) in high school after moving to a very religious part of Indiana. I've been called the devil's spawn, threatened, alienated, and told to go to hell. I overheard my boss saying nasty things about atheists and I'm afraid that he'll ever find out I am one. Then there are those who consistently pursue me in hopes of "saving" me when I just want to be left alone.

I can understand the frustration from some atheists, but like you I don't hate or judge Christians. You are entitled to believe what you want. I would just appreciate it if believers wouldn't encroach on my life and take it as "attacking" when I say no.

(Some of the atheists on here really are attacking, though, wish they'd be more respectable -.-)

I feel sad that that happened to you. You do have the right to live your life your way as long as it doesn't hurt others and being an atheist isn't hurting anyone else. In a recent post I asked a question of an atheist and he called me a moron because i wanted to know why this group sued the Fed. gov. to have all religous symbols removed from public places. What he did was retaliate with name calling and condescending words. I like to get along with all people-no matter what they believe. I guess there are hateful people everywhere! Good luck to you and may you have a peace filled day!

Late reply. I belive there are religious bigots, and atheist bigots. Name calling is very immature. I apologize on the behalf of my other atheists who feel the need to be...well jerks. Good luck to you too!

I though Nancy Regan was going to predict it in the stars.....

And you, I assume, are perfect.

I had read some of the things associated with him, sounds like "the Church" is going backwards..

Dashing,

Exactly why I respect him even more. Pope Francis, welcome!

I have several friends who are atheist. I am always perplexed by their intense, compelling feeling of telling believers they are wrong. If you have no belief system then why even waste your time here on the post. Maybe the reason is that you are trying so hard to convince others because you spend your life convincing and reaffirming this to yourself. That's why I always see the multitudes of atheists lining up to feed and care for the poor.

Thank goodness your big bang created your big knowledge base.

"Atheist - no rhyme, no reason, no responsibility to anything or anyone but themselves."

REMEMBER, GOD LOVES THE ATHEIST.

No one is trying to convince you. But religion is forced in our faces every where we go. We have a similar right to express.

Well if you walk into a church there are going to be religion, you open up an article about the electing of a new pope, pretty sure it will have a religious bases. It is the nonacceptance that the none believers have that i distance myself from them.

I am always perplexed by their intense, compelling feeling of telling believers they are wrong.

Trust me, for every "firebrand" atheist telling you that you are wrong, there are 10 of us sitting quietly. After all, 20% of the population is "not affiliated with a religion" and nearly 10% don't believe in a god. Interestingly only 2% identify as "atheist".

I never force my disbelief into the faces of others. A nice, respectable debate? Sure. But I consistently am approached by believers who try to convince me they're right. Some of them are nice about it, some, not so much.

Just as WeAllHaveOpinions says, we get to see and hear it every day. And, as EngEsq has said, for the most part we're quiet about it.

Try not to paint all atheists the same color. I know there are many good believers out there even though the majority of my experiences with believers were negative.

the chief,

Yes, we atheists are so contentious! So appalling! We use the English language to attack claims! What do people of faith do when they get angry? They fly planes into buildings.

Apparently, the pen is mightier than the sword. Get used to it. Freethinkers are realizing it isn't moral to remain silent against injustice. Like the gay community, we are everywhere. We are your doctors, attorneys, scientists, veterinarians, and have representation in every area of human endeavor.

It is true that it's possible that religion can produce evil, and generally when we look closer at the detail it produces evil because the individual people are actually living in a rejection of the tenets of Christianity and a rejection of the God that they are supposed to be following. So it can produce it, but the historical fact is that outright rejection of God and institutionalizing of atheism actually does produce evil on incredible levels.

We can start with Stalin - Joseph Stalin's atheistic regime killed tens of millions of people, oh you probably don't know that because you probably don't know much about the history of true Atheists, and no I'm not comparing you to Stalin.

The total body count of those murdered by Atheist regimes and leaders for the ninety years between 1917 and 2007 is approximately 148 million dead at the bloody hands of fifty-two atheists, three times more than all the human beings killed by war, civil war, and individual crime in the entire twentieth century combined.

The historical record of collective atheism is thus 182,716 times worse on an annual basis than Christianity's worst and most infamous misdeed, the Spanish Inquisition. It is not only Stalin and Mao who were so murderously inclined, they were merely the worst of the lot. For every Pol Pot whose infamous name is still spoken with horror today, there was a Mengistu, a Bierut, and a Choibalsan, godless men whose names are now forgotten everywhere but in the lands they once ruled with a red hand.

If one considers the statistically significant size of the historical atheist set and contrasts it with the fact that not one in a thousand religious leaders have committed similarly large-scale atrocities, it is impossible to conclude otherwise, even if we do not yet understand exactly why this should be the case. Once might be an accident, even twice could be coincidence, but fifty-two incidents in ninety years reeks of causation!

Remember that I started my paragraph with I have friends who are atheist and no they don't shove it down my throat, no atheists are not appalling, no their not contentious...and yes there are many on this post that don't start their posts with the fact their atheist just as I don't with the fact I am a Christian, however, when your post name is Atheist and you want to tackle religion and throw in "we fly planes into buildings"...no we don't ..religious fanatics do. As there are Atheist fanatics, yet I'll bet you have no clue about who they might be, then stay tuned for someone far more educated than you my friend atheist-6939529. Any of this look familiar to ya?

-no recognition of an ultimate judge of moral actions.

-lack of seeing the importance of human beings as images of God and so easily discarding them as merely material things, products of mere chance. Hello Big bang

-lack of acknowledging an external standard of moral perfection, thus ending up with self-created standards which include killing for political survival.

-absence of guidance by divine revelation of the moral law, such as "Thou shalt not kill".

-following an ethic of atheistic evolutionism that is based on the survival and victory of the fittest, which is ultimately a "bloodthirsty ethic", the words of Joseph Ratzinger, that is an ethic that is eager to kill and to maim. This ethic is about conquering others rather than self-conquest.

In a population of over 7 billion, it's no doubt there are many in all professions who are atheist. If your so talented with the English language then, quote what is actually said rather than mix words, and inject impression to create antagonism. That's what your really good at.

the-Chief,

That argument is old. Yes Stalin was an atheist (though who knows, he did study in seminary!). But lets say he was. Would you call Stalin a bastion of critical thinking? I don't know anyone who would.

For example, millions starved under Stalin because he took quack advice from unscientific agriculturalists. Stalin ruled more like a quasi-religion in fact, with his absolute ruler stance. You think Stalin represented a secular democracy? That's whay you're implying! He did not.

If you want to pull out Stalin, I can claim Hitler was a baptized Catholic who touted Jesus at every political opportunity that suited him. Never excommunicated. You want Hitler under your column as a Christian?

Atheism has a simple definition: lack of a belief in gods/supernatural. Atheism doesn't mean libertarian, republican, communist, tree-hugger, dog walker, etc. Come on, definitions are definitions. You want to see something that isn't there.

So tell me, when is the last time you saw a bunch of atheists rioting out in the street? Are you aware atheists make up the smallest "religion" demographic in US prisons? Less that a percent! Guess which religion is vastly over represented in US jails? Christians. (1997 US Bureau of Prisons).

Excommunicate somebody for such a little (and ultimately pretty funny) thing? Are you really certain that you know what "excommunicate" means?

Anyway, considering the character of the new Pope, I think it possible that his only reaction could (possibly) be sending to this bishop an "ABC" book for first graders with a little note "My dear son, my name is spelled "B-E-R-G-O-G-L-I-O" and a little smiley face...)))

Maciej

"Excommunicate somebody for such a little (and ultimately pretty funny) thing? Are you really certain that you know what "excommunicate" means?"

Precisely the problem with "todays attitude". When the conclave started, it is made very clear to every Cardinal regarding the leaking of information to the media. Incredible steps were taken to make sure the vote was kept secret and the results were kept secret. All the cardinals were advised that any leak would result in "excommunication the individuals involved. Not my idea of what the results should be but that is one of the basic rules which governs the conclave.

Conclave comes from the Latin "cum-clave" meaning literally "with key" – the cardinal-electors are locked in the Sistine Chapel each day until Benedict XVI's successor was chosen. During the conclave they were allowed no contact with the outside the world – no papers, no TV, no phones, no Twitter. And the world is allowed no contact with them. The threat of excommunication hangs over any cardinal who breaks the rules. Before the conclave starts, the Sistine Chapel is swept for recording equipment and hidden cameras to maintain this secrecy Every papal conclave has required each cardinal to take a solemn oath under the threat of excommunication "to observe, both with clerics and laymen, the secrecy of all that regards the election of the Roman pontiff and what takes place in the place of election."

This threat of excommunication has been around since the beginning and is one of many rules which encapsulates the concave. So yes I am very educated in "what excommunication means" and also what it means to follow rules or laws.

Advising the population in Milan that their Cardinal was elected was not only incorrect but against the rules set forth in the beginning. And no not so amusing for the folks in Milan who began passing on the same incorrect info to all their contacts.

I guess when you tell your kids not to do something, you probably laugh when they turn around and do it. Your probably the parent who counts to ten and then counts to twenty because your kids do anything they want because they know you think its "ultimately pretty funny".

How about "because there are some catholics in USA"?

Because Vatican City is actually considered to be a country, or a city-state if you prefer.

The Vatican is a Country. Papal law rules the city/country not Italian.

"maciej

How about "because there are some catholics in USA"?"

Hey Maciej, how about because the Vatican is a country with a country (the tiniest country in the world and the entire country is within Rome. Yes I've been there five times and know it well. The Holy See (Vatican) maintains formal diplomatic relations with 174 nations and 68 of these countries maintain permanent resident diplomatic missions accredited to the Holy See in Rome. The Holy See maintains 106 permanent diplomatic missions to nation-states around the world.

There is a lot more to it than just "because there are some Catholics in USA" although the United Stated has the third largest population of Catholics in the world. And Maciej , no I'm not a Catholic, I'm just educated.

annie, President Reagan was the first to establish diplomatic ties between the US and the Vatican. I've always wondered if that could be removed on Constitutional grounds. No politician is gutsy enough to risk angering people of faith to try it is my guess.

Must not anger the "Christian Taliban."

I do not think the Catholic church "pounds" for all their money any more than any other organized religion. In the US, I work daily with people who are struggling to pay their living expenses and eat yet they HAVE TO TITHE AT LEAST 10% per their religion. They are convinced that that 10% is not theirs, it belongs to God and the church. My come back is "if God is all knowing and all seeing and all forgiving then God knows what you are going through and will understand if, for a while, you cannot give the 10%, he will forgive you until you get back on your feet". Sometimes it works and sometimes they say they will pray for me.......all organized religions want donations, the Catholic church clearly does not have a monopoly on that!

It depends. Your god is not mine. In that sentence should "god" have a capital G? No, it should not. If "god" is a given name, then it should have a capital "g". If "god" refers to one religion's primary deity, it does not necessarily follow that it should have a capital "g". I do not have to capitalize "god" if I am referring to the Christian god because I am not a Christian. It is not MY "god" ... it may be yours and you are free to capitalize the word in all of your writings since that is what you believe. My deities are not yours and yours is not mine. I do not ask you to follow what I believe and I should not be expected to follow what you believe. If the writer of the piece is an atheist or a Wiccan or a Buddhist, or any OTHER religion besides the Abrahamic (Jewish/Christian/Muslim) they would not capitalize "god" since their beliefs are different. You ASSuming that the writer is Christian is JUST that - an ASSumption.

What are you talking about? What is wrong in taking the name in reference to Saint Francis?

I am just DYING to know - how a Pope should look? Please enlighten me! Pleaasee!

He has been pope for less than a day. It would be surprising if he promised anything already. I'm more concerned with the example he sets rather than the words he says.

I would like to see the Catholic church permit artificial means of birth control as it is the most effective means of bringing people out of poverty. I would also like to see them permit married priests, female priests, stop preaching against LGBT people. I expect none of those things from this pope but I do hope he will stop persecuting nuns who work for social justice and turn the attention of the church toward service to the poor and powerless and away from obsessing about people's sex lives. I hope he instructs the church in this country to stop engaging in politics and wasting resources bringing lawsuits against civil laws that are none of their concern. I hope that his lessons in humility include teaching his bishops to spread their faith by teaching and persuasion and not by trying to impose those beliefs through civil law.

It is slowly being abolished in an excellent way: through education. Big Faith is primarily a Third World problem now with the notable exception of the USA. However, even in the USA faith is losing serious ground with people under 35. That is excellent news as a whole generation is growing up with a large section immunized against it. Well, hopefully.

Africa is a big area of growth for Big Faith. Why? Lack of education, tons of superstition, and fertile wombs. It's the WalMart of Faith if you will and religion is devoting enormous resources to stay in the game there. Remember, AIDS is bad but contraception is worse (that's the Catholic Church's defacto slogan). Faith is winning there. Africans need our help, the help of those who don't have the faith virus.

I urge people of no faith to donate time and money to the many organizations helping Africa from a humanist perspective. We must not sit idly by.

We are ALL Africans, it is the birthplace of humanity.

Stephanie Chastain:

YOU WROTE: "The Catholic Church should be abolished. It holds the record for more death, genocide and torture than any other institution."

MY RESPONSE: Really? Where's your documentation? Or do you just make up such reckless claims hoping that casual readers will accept them as FACTS? I've frequently heard/read that same false hysteria spewed by many individuals, who ALWAYS fail to include supporting documentation. And when I ask for their sources of information, they never seem able to cite any. So, post your documentation or remain silent!...crickets, crickets, crickets.

In any case, I've got a news flash for you: the greatest evils in history usually resulted from the denial of God, not the pursuit of Him. In the last century alone, more innocent people were murdered, tortured, and enslaved by secular ideologies – Nazism and Communism – than by all religions in recorded history. And I have the documentation to backup that statement.

Grab a copy of the Guinness Book of World Records and turn to the category "Judicial," sub-heading "Crimes: Mass killings." You'll find that carnage of unimaginable proportions resulted not from religion, but from institutionalized atheism. Guinness reports, "The greatest massacre ever imputed by the government of one sovereign against another is the 26.3 million Chinese killed during the regime of Mao Zedong between 1949 and May 1965 (total of 16 years)."

The Walker report published by the U.S. Senate Committee of the Judiciary in July 1971 went one step further. It placed "…the total death toll in China since 1949 (total of 22 years) between 32.25 and 61.7 million." For our purposes, I think it's reasonable to accept the figure of 47 million killed in China as a compromise average for the 22-year span mentioned in the Walker report.

In addition, Adolf Hitler murdered six million Jews during the holocaust, which was performed for ethnic cleansing and false economics. Hitler was a social Darwinist, slaughtering people who didn't fit his concept of an Aryan master race. That's why he also sent an untold number of gypsies, homosexuals, the mentally impaired, and other "undesirables" to the gas chambers.

In the USSR, Nobel Prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn estimated that state repression and terrorism took over 60 million lives from 1917 to 1959 under Lenin, Stalin, and Khrushchev. However, the worst known per-capita genocide of all time happened in Cambodia under Pol Pot. According to Guinness, "More than one third of the eight million Khmers were killed between April 17, 1975 and January 1979."

Let me add to that mix some other recent atheist rulers who slaughtered vast numbers of people: Kim Il-Sung of North Korea dispatched approximately 1,600,000 people; Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia killed an estimated 1,072,000 people; and Nicolae Ceausescue of Romania put to death 60,000 folks.

In contrast, a recent comprehensive compilation of the history of ALL HUMAN WARFARE IN RECORDED HISTORY, "Encyclopedia of Wars" (a three-volume set by Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod), documented 1,763 wars, of which only 123 have been classified to involve a religious conflict. So, what the anti-religion bigots, such as yourself, would consider to be "most" really amounts to LESS THAN 7% OF ALL WARS in history involve religion. Most wars are fought for power, territory, and resources, according to historians.

Furthermore, here's a comparative tally exactly pertinent to our discussion: the total number of deaths estimated to lie at the feet of Christianity throughout recorded history is approximately 17 million. This number can be derived from totals presented in the "Encyclopedia of Wars" along with various websites, and includes ancient wars, the Crusades, the Inquisitions, various European wars during the Middle Ages, and even witchcraft trials. For the sake of argument, let's assume that the other two predominant religions (Judaism and Islam) are responsible for an equal number of deaths because there is no known documentation for those estimates. That brings us to 51 million deaths attributable to the three predominant religions throughout recorded history. Even if you add to that total the deaths attributable to obscure religions, you'd still be hard pressed to match the 120+ million death toll achieved by atheist leaders during the LAST CENTURY ALONE.

Therefore 17 million deaths attributable to Christianity throughout all of recorded history (or 51 million estimated deaths attributable to all three main religions) pales in comparison to the 120+ million deaths attributable to atheist leaders during just the 20TH CENTURY ALONE!

The obvious conclusion here is that atheist leaders are far more brutal, sadistic, and savage on a far larger scale than religious folks have ever been. The FACTS speak for themselves...you just have to examine them with an open mind. Otherwise, your ignorance and anti-religion bigotry will continue to cloud your thinking.

You might want to ponder the words of Will Rogers, who once said, "It's not the things we don't know
that gets us into trouble. It's the things we know that just ain't true."

Oh, by the way, I'm not Christian, Jewish or Muslim. I'm a Deist who doesn't belong to any particular organized religion. I'm just trying to combat the ignorance supporting the rampant anti-religion bigotry on this thread.

If there were no God, there would be no atheists. ~ G. K. Chesterton