“I wonder on what basis anyone can say condoms make AIDS worse. The Pope is either stupid, ignorant or dim.” so says Richard Dawkins, speaking at a the University of Valencia after having been awarded an honorary degree. [LINK]
Dawkins was referring to the Pope’s comments in Africa earlier this year where the Pope said this about HIV/AIDS: “You can’t resolve it with the distribution of condoms. On the contrary, it increases the problem.”

Dawkins loves to stir things up as it were but he’s not alone. The pontiff’s comments have prompted widespread criticism around the world from health activists, medical professionals and politicians. Dawkins later stated his position was actually mis-quoted and in fact he had said “stupid, ignorant or wicked“.

The Pope also urged Africans to give up superstitious beliefs and adopt the catholic faith [LINK]. But isn’t that just exchanging one set of superstitions for another? E.g. Why is a man who came back from the dead or bread that turns into flesh or wine that turns into blood any more credible than a witch doctor? Let’s call a spade a spade.

The Pope is getting a lot of bad press these days. A nine year old girl was raped by her step-father in Brazil and impregnated with twins [LINK]. Being only nine the poor girl was physically too small to successfully deliver these babies, even by c-section. So the family and doctors organized an abortion.

The catholic church under Pope Benedict promptly ex-communicated the entire family, except the girl. The Church excommunicated the doctors who performed the procedure as well. The abuse had gone on since the girl was 6, authorities said. Now get this, they did NOT ex-communicate the step-father who raped the 9 year old. Amazing.

There’s also new information coming to light of an official papal bull from 1962 which “The Vatican instructed Catholic bishops around the world to cover up cases of sexual abuse or risk being thrown out of the Church.” [LINK]

You can read the document yourself “PDF HERE“. This document was sent out to every bishop in the world. If you really can’t stomach it, skip to the blue-outlined bits.

“The Observer has obtained a 40-year-old confidential document from the secret Vatican archive which lawyers are calling a ‘blueprint for deception and concealment’. One British lawyer acting for Church child abuse victims has described it as ‘explosive’. “

There have been 12,000 confirmed cases of child abuse within the catholic church to date. The true number is believed to be much larger.

Let’s take the word “church” out of the equation. If this was just a group like any other, we’d all be outraged beyond belief.

The Murphy Report which came out in 3Q of this year shows us just that.

“Ireland’s police colluded with the Catholic church in covering up clerical child abuse in Dublin on a huge scale, according to a damning report on decades of sex crimes committed by priests.”

“One priest admitted abusing more than 100 children. Another said he had committed abuse every two weeks for more than 25 years.”

“I read the report as justice minister. But on a human level – as a father and as a member of this community – I felt a growing sense of revulsion and anger at the horrible, evil acts committed against children.”

A key trait of dogma and religion is that it never changes. Religions are not set up to accommodate new information or cultural changes in society as that would require admitting that God had to be updated. To draw a parallel from Astrology which refused to update the astrological signs when it was discovered that there are many many other planets of equal size to Pluto. How come these new planets don’t effect my horoscope? Or how about the 13th sign of the zodiac (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiuchus) which appeared when the earth’s axis shifted? Just leave that one out. It’s very hard to update any system which doesn’t base itself on evidence, logic and reasoning.

Law and Science on the other hand constantly evolve based on new information.

In summary:

1. AIDS will kill you but don’t use a condom. This applies even if you’re married.
2. Rape of your step daughter for 3 years straight is ok but abortion even in the case of rape is NOT ok, even when the mother or kids or both would likely die.
3. Child abuse is ok, just don’t talk about it.
4. Superstition is not ok but men who rise from the dead and transcend into heaven are totally believable. And if you don’t believe it you’re going to Hell.
5. Earth now rotates through 13 Constellations but there are still only 12 signs of the Zodiac.

My point in this post is not to attack the Catholic Church but simply to highlight that any system based purely on an ideology is inherently bad.

To quote Richard Feynman talking about his father:

…there was a picture of the Pope with everybody bowing in front of him. And he’s say, ‘Now, look at these humans,’ he’d say, ‘here’s one human standing here, and all these others are bowing. Now, what is the difference? “

“This man has the same human problems; he eats dinner like anybody else, he goes to the bathroom, he has the same kind of problems as everybody, he’s a human being. Why are they all bowing to him? Only because of his name and his position, because of his uniform, not because of something he especially did or his honour or something like that.”

I would not say that I am anti-religion, it is true that faith and religion help billions of people cope with every day life. I can say that I do not share that point of view and strive all the time to better understand it.

What history shows is if you disengage your critical thinking, forgo reason, stop asking questions and just go on “faith” you no longer have a system of checks and balances.  When this deals with moral, developmental, health and cultural issues it becomes very dangerous indeed.