Put the Vatican up for Sale, Save the World

By Tim Martin
Times-Standard
March 10, 2013

http://www.times-standard.com/guest_opinion/ci_22759433/put-vatican-up-sale-save-world

I'm sure you heard the news. Pope Benedict XVI recently broke with 600 years of tradition and threw in the towel. His resignation, along with blackmail allegations against the Vatican, sexual abuse cover-ups, and advocating for homophobia, has hit the titanic church like an iceberg and is slowly pulling it to the bottom.

The Roman Catholic Church has long had delusions of adequacy. Lately, it's become clear just how deep and wide the chasm is between Catholicism and the modern world.

When Pope Benedict retired, he left behind a wave of ill-ease and a slew of unresolved crises. Among them are 4,450 priests accused of sexual abuse in the U.S. between 1950 and 2002 -- according to a 2004 draft survey for the U.S. Conference of Bishops -- that remain oddly unrepentant for their behavior, a clergy that is totally oblivious to the plight of women, and an institution that has little if any relevance to the human race in the 21st century.

It amazes me that Pope Benedict was considered “The Holy Father” during his time as spiritual leader of the church. Especially since he ordered all files on sexual abuse sent to his office, and knew more about the movement of child predators between parishes than anyone. Instead of retiring, Benedict should have resigned over his inability to address the widespread abuse perpetrated by church priests around the world, and the subsequent cover-ups. It would have been the Christian thing to do.

The church's ongoing stance against birth control is another momentous problem Pope Benedict chose to ignore. If a woman wants to hold down a job, she needs to be able to control her fertility. Constantly wondering if you're pregnant makes working outside the home nearly impossible. Eighty nine percent of all Catholic women now support the use of contraception, but church officials don't care. What concerns them most is money. The Vatican wants its flock to go forth and multiply. This ensures there will always be future generations tithing and/or dropping money in the collection plate.

In the business community this is known as a Ponzi Scheme.

Regrettably, the pope's actions have been nothing short of criminal. On a trip to Cameroon, he refused to back the use of condoms to stem the spread of AIDS in Africa, knowing full well that countless people are infected with HIV every year as a result of unprotected sex. As Cardinal Ratzinger, he sent a letter in May 2001 to the bishops of the church, threatening them with excommunication if they went to the authorities and revealed information about child sex abuse, according to documents obtained by the Observer, a British newspaper. I'm guessing that no amount of “Hail Marys” or “Our Fathers” will get Pope Benedict to within a thousand yards of the Pearly Gates for what he has condoned.

The Catholic Church has been around for centuries, but it's slowly writing its own epitaph. The world is trying to lift itself out of darkness at a time when fear and hatred has a network. What is the church doing to help? Nothing. Attendance among the young is in sharp decline, while non-denominational spirituality is surging. Catholicism's murky notions of love, sex, and God are dangerously out of touch, constricted, and exclusionary. They have repulsed entire generations of gays, women and multicultural people. In other words, the church has become useless, and way beyond its expiration date.

But what would you expect from a religion that took 350 years to admit that the earth circles around the sun?

I'm a firm believer that you don't need a religion to have a relationship with God. A truly good person is one who preaches the gospel of worshipping individually. No one is a holder of the divine truth, not even the pope. No one knows what happens when we die. Let's not waste our lives trying figure out the impossible. Instead, let's strive for peace and happiness, and try in some small way to make this world a happier place to live.

For starters we can sell the Vatican, feed the hungry, and house the poor with the proceeds. Why not? A church with no followers is just a collection of empty buildings, an accumulation of wealth, and men wearing funny hats.