thegreekdog wrote:PLAYER57832 wrote:crispybits wrote:It's not just complicity, by definition the religion is fascist itself. It's hardly a surprise that it finds like-minded types to share afternoon coffee and cake with.
No more than your idea that anyone with faith is obviously not thinking straight.
No single idea is fascism, fascism is about not allowing opposition. Most modern Christians are no less willing to let others be than atheists.
The article was humerous, and largely because it did have just enough truth in it to be painful.. but expanded. Trying to paint is as anything else is beneath you crispy.
The problem with crispy and chang is that they are ignoring history. They are using the support of some Catholics and some priests and some bishops in Nazi Germany for the Nazis to paint the Catholic Church, in its entirety, as supportive of Nazi Germany. That simply isn't true. They are going to point to Pope John Paul's apology as evidence that the Catholic Church acknowledged its support of Nazi Germany. But that wasn't what John Paul apologized for - he apologized for anti-Semitism promoted by the Catholic Church across history (i.e. from the founding of the Church forward).
Basically, there were some portion of priests and bishops (and Catholics) in Nazi Germany who supported the Nazis. There were a lot of other priests, bishops and Catholics who did not support Nazi Germany. Some or all of those people either escaped or were killed by Nazi Germany. The Nazis killed Catholics, because of their religion, in Poland. Catholics from all over the world, including priests, fought in armies against Nazi Germany.
In any event, this is a fun way for atheists to try to denigrate the Catholic Church. There are much better ways to do so that have some basis in fact.
OK, maybe "by definition" was a touch strong, but the cathoilc church runs along lines inherently similar to fascist politics. There is an overall dictator (the pope), oppressing the population by means of strict controls (heaven and hell), and suppressing the opposition through terror (anyone not "one of us" is going to hell). Further to that there is a stirring up of religious identity in a very divisive way, similar to secular nationalism and racism. All of this is by modern actions, if we go into history then there are even greater parallels, especially in suppressing the opposition, but of course the response you'll give is the typical "what the church did in the past isn't relevant any more". I call BS to that, what any organisation does is relevant when the philosophy of that organisation is largely identical now as it was then, and the doctrines and teachings of the catholic church are largely unchanged for hundreds of years on the primary points.