The Roman Catholic Church

[Orfuln]

Following the death of Sinead O'Connor.

Obviously the acts and crimes of this church are vast and can't be contained to one place. But in honour of a great woman, if you find it in yourself, give your testimony here.

Mine : my father was institutionalised, brutalised and brainwashed in childhood by the Catholic organisation who schooled him following the death of his father. He was an unhappy and violent man who didn't understand family relationships and consequently my own childhood was blighted with violence and misery. I did however learn my catechism very well. I now absolutely reject it.

Any of us could not have been born for any of the multitudes that goes wrong from conception and during pregnancy, abortion is a comparatively minor risk for a developing foetus when compared with nature. It is actually a minor (non religious) miracle of nature to be any of the numerous people who are born versus all of the “potential” for babies out there.

I don’t think that you owe anything for being born the culture and practice of Bessborough or Tuam. Your birth does not vindicate the harm that places like these and the culture and practices that surrounded and supported them has anymore than my birth does. I will definitely have to agree to disagree with you on that logic.

I've posted before about how a priest behaved inappropriately to me when I was at school. It was in the position of an open confession (so in a room, no barrier as in the confessional).

I didn't have the courage to tell anyone at the time, though I asked a friend what happened in her confession and nothing out of the ordinary it sounded.

I hope it couldn't happen now, with more modern safeguarding guidelines.

We had similar apparently in my extended family, with marriages not being considered real because they weren't held in a Catholic Church.

My DGM was brought up Catholic and had some stories to tell about the nuns at her school, including that they would tie her left hand behind her back to force her to write right handed.

I went to an RC high school. Not a good place to be. And I've never known people as hypocritical as my exh's family-all
Staunch RC and for the most part very unpleasant. Minor experiences compared to some but certainly don't make me see the RC church in a good light.

That said, there are awful things in every church, faith, denomination whatever. Everywhere people gather and try to persuade other problem they are right and everyone else is wrong you will find abuse of power and people covering it up. Humans aren't intrinsically good beings it seems when in groups.

My dad is convinced the BBC made up the Catholic abuse scandal for some weird reason. He won't believe it one bit. He can't, it's cognitive dissonance - if he believes that, he'll have to question everything else he's believed for the last 70 years and that would be too difficult. He was indoctrinated so much.

He tried to force me into it too but my mum was very relaxed on religion and we moved to england from Ireland so it was impossible for him to stop me realising it wasn't the only way. He's had a very guilt and shame filled life and has such resentment that his wife and kids don't worship him as a patriarch like Catholicism said they should. A very angry and frustrated man. Can't blame it all on religion but it certainly has had negative affects on him and us.

And I still get tingly arse pain from hours and hours sat on stone seats in the church as a child. All about the suffering.

That said, there are awful things in every church, faith, denomination whatever. Everywhere people gather and try to persuade other problem they are right and everyone else is wrong you will find abuse of power and people covering it up. Humans aren't intrinsically good beings it seems when in groups.

That is very a very succinct description of the evils of religion. I will be using that when talking to my daughter. Thanks.

Sorry for the all bold shouting 😳

YY! All about the suffering for the normal Joe Soap though, not the bloody priest. I detest them.

All big institutions can have these issues, the Catholic Church was just bigger and more powerful than most, its a product of human nature. I will say that when my Grandmother (raised catholic) who had married a man from another faith in the 1940's was left stranded and with 4 young kids in London after he suddenly died at 40 it was the catholic church that helped her to relocate back to Scotland to be near her own family when her late husbands family and community turned their back on her. I've known some really wonderful priests and nuns and know the church can do a lot of good too.

I'm not especially religious although I was raised catholic and still go to mass. I hope the church is better now, I think there were issues especially in Ireland where there was an expectation that someone in the family should have a vocation and so people were shoe horned against their will in or gay people were forced into rather than having a true vocation. I think that made people bitter and vindictive.

I do think priests should be allowed to marry as they used to way back. We had a young priest moved on a few years ago after it was felt he was forming an attachment to a young woman who sang in the church.

Anyway, people who think the roman catholic church is just all evil and should be done away with are just as bad as those who think it can do no wrong.

Ann Lovett - Fucking HORRENDOUS

https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/ann-lovett-death-of-a-strong-kick-ass-girl-1.3429792

I am not a fan or organised religion. Especially not those which decree that women and girls are second-class citizens and should obey rules laid down by men.

Also if people especially non Catholics were saying such things about other faiths and making generalised comments about Catholics that they happen to know it would be branded as some kind of anti-ism or phobia, but anti-Catholic sentiments and sectarianism is still acceptable, endorsed even in the UK it seems.

Irish family, all the cousins go to church, baptism, communion, confirmation for all their kids etc...

Well, I'm Irish and living in Ireland, surrounded by family, friends and extended family who all had the same devoutly Catholic upbringing as I had, and none of them are going to church other than for weddings and funerals, and those who have their children baptised etc, do so out of habit, and because their children are, by and large, still at Catholic schools.

Once you take away that conformity in a school system which is still vestigially Catholic, that will die off. My son is at an Educate Together school, and only two children out of his class of 27 took up the option of attending First Communion prep classes after school and making their FC.

I agree with @Chickenkeev that it's high time this stranglehold on the education system ended. It's an anachronism, and bears no relationship at all to the majority of the population's actual beliefs or practices.

My parents' parish's (tiny) attendance for mass consists of over 75s and immigrants from the Philippines and west Africa.

My mum used to say she cried at night thinking of all her children going to hell (for not going to church anymore) - she would obviously be in heaven with my dad! It didn't sound too much like heaven to me!

I agree that the UK has a deep suspicion of Catholicism built into its social and political DNA.

Anyway, people who think the roman catholic church is just all evil and should be done away with are just as bad as those who think it can do no wrong.

This, on the other hand, is deeply silly. It's a demonstrably corrupt organisation. The fact that there are, absolutely, good priests and nuns, and that at times and in some places, the church provided social care which wasn't otherwise available (which is why pregnant girls were still going to Bessborough until it closed), doesn't make that any less true.

"I agree that the UK has a deep suspicion of Catholicism built into its social and political DNA."

Absolutely.

I didn't say you couldn't be critical of the catholic church, I am myself on many instances but many seem to think it is literally an evil institution with no good in it at all which is total rubbish and just the same black and white thinking that blinkers people to it crimes. The same goes for any institution or class of people that it becomes taboo to criticize.

I grew up with a parent who’d been so badly abused in a Catholic boarding school, we were not allowed to board or even attend Catholic day schools but instead had catechism every Saturday morning and only went to mass once a week or so. Ironically that’s the only place I felt safe, as there was much abuse and neglect at home.

My faith was vitally important to me as a child and there is still a sad, broken part where it used to live. I have very mixed feelings about the church and feel defensive when Protestants criticise it yet I’ve completely distanced myself as an adult.

Interesting comments. Not sure what Sinéad would make of some of them today. She had very strong religious feelings and was ordained a priest by Bishop Pat Buckley. He was originally Catholic priest but later joined a Catholic sect whose name I can't recall.

Of course she was very interested in Buddhism and latterly Islam too.

Also Rastafarianism lest we forget . Speaking of misogynistic faiths. She was catholic with a small C perhaps? Something of a mystic.

This is such a bullshit argument. You sort out your own house first. And the catholic church has fought tooth and nail against every attempt to do this. Further prolonging the suffering of their victims. While railing against everyone else. They should keep their heads down and their traps shut and compensate the children and women they abused, and the families of those they murdered. Read the room catholic church! We're not the scared, faux pious minions of the 80s anymore ffs.

For a semi-fictional account of a young woman growing up in the Catholic Church, I'd recommend Antonia White's four novels starting with Frost In May - absolutely horrific and very true to life.

The tridentine church iirc

Also, the Rwanda genocide. They didn't speak out and didn't even try to help the people who were massacred in churches.

amp-theguardian-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/20/pope-francis-asks-for-forgiveness-for-churchs-role-in-rwanda-genocide?amp_gsa=1&amp_js_v=a9&usqp=mq331AQIUAKwASCAAgM%3D#amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&aoh=16904720134340&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fworld%2F2017%2Fmar%2F20%2Fpope-francis-asks-for-forgiveness-for-churchs-role-in-rwanda-genocide

@Chickenkeev No it isn't a bullshit argument as any Catholic in areas like Glasgow or Liverpool will tell you. Many people hate Catholics out of sheer prejudice and have no understanding of Catholicism . I had some boys tried to carve the word TIM into my forehead when I was 13 just because I was Catholic. I'm sorry people don't like being called out on it but the UK has a great deal of anti-Catholic sentiment and topics like this give them great joy to pile on in and rubbish the faith of millions of people around the world, it wouldn't be acceptable for any other faith.

Like I say you critique the problems and crimes of the church without shitting all over Catholicism as a whole.

@WhenSomedayComes That resonates with me. I met a lovely Franciscan nun a few years ago and gave vent to my rage about the institution. To which she agreed. She complained about the awful boring sermons but ' I am here for the Eucharist'.

She had done a lot of teaching and other work in deprived areas and taken a degree in Psychology which she said she couldn't have done with the church. But women like her should be in the priesthood really. Otherwise the church is finished. To which many ppl will say Amen. The downside being nothing will replace it here except possessive individualism.

The State in Ireland has been like a proverbial deadbeat dad for years only now taking some responsibility.

NO! It's delightful that you clearly remain ignorant of the crimes of your church (things that would be considered as war crimes in a different context) but the fact remains, this is the truth. How dare you try to minimise. Read up on the Tuam babies. The forced adoptions to America. The lack of access to contraception and divorce. The hatred of gay people. Of course, Liverpool is some nirvana where these things never applied so it's not a problem for you. But these are the teachings of your church, so are you ok with them? Or are you cherry picking?