Hankering for somewhere that brings all the Catholic Church’s condemnations of homosexuality together in one place? You’re in luck. The Vatican is introducing a new news information portal that aggregates all the antigay attacks in print, online, radio and television media in a single place. The new site, www.news.va, was personally overseen by Pope Benedict XVI.
The site debuted on the 60th anniversary of Benedict’s ordination as a priest, which would ordinarily call for diamonds as the appropriate gift, but we figured that a guy who has red pumps probably already has everything he needs.
The goal of the site is to share the Vatican’s news, aka the finest thoughts of the 14th century, with the world. It will even use social media, which promises to be the ecclesiastical equivalent of your great-aunt’s Facebook page. We will be interested to see what they do with the remaining 133 characters in their Tweets, once they’ve used up “gay” and “hell.”
Msgr. Claudio Maria Celli (no, we don’t know if he’s friends call him Mary for short), who heads the Vatican office that developed the portal, says it will help the Vatican’s ossified bureaucracy better understand how to communicate with the world. Benedict could use a little help in that area himself, having tripped repeatedly over his tongue, such as suggesting that condom distribution “even aggravates the problems” of the HIV epidemic—unlike, say the Vatican policy of preferring HIV infection to disease prevention.
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
It’s not just the rest of the world that the Vatican is trying to catch up with. It’s also its own rank and file. Many priests are already well versed in how to use the Internet, judging from the volume of them who have been accused of harboring child pornography on their computers.
Photo via Osservatore Romano
XTIAAN
since when has the vaticans homophobia NOT been a mouse click away?
does queerty have teh googles?
Kev C
It looks like a personal webpage. Not as good as Carrottop’s.
christopher di spirito
I may add Pope RatNAZI to my twitter just to give him hell.
This Prada-wearing freak needs to know not everyone in the twitterverse welcomes him with open arms.
Jim Hlavac
Ah, nothing new — my family has been fighting the Catholic Church since they burned Jan Hus at the stake on July 6th, 1415 after the Church lied about wanting to have a talk with the Rector of Charles University (they hated knowledge back then too, weirdly enough.) He came to say hello, they burned him near immediately on faggots already in place at the stake. Back then the Czechs rose up in holy indignation, and started the 100 year long Hussite Wars, which was followed by the 30 Years War when the Germans and the Lutherans came to haunt the Czech nation. The Nazis came later. Geez, must my family and I still be fighting these German & Italian fascist men in dresses bitching about drag queens claiming that poverty is good while living in gold encrusted palaces now for six hundred freakin’ years? And now all my Hussite family getting together for the family reunion and lovin’ me to tickled pink and now, because we’re NYers — now they’re putting the pressure on me to get married, and settle down with a nice guy behind a picket fence! Well, we Czechs have a cute sentence for the Pope — strc prst skrz prdl — and I kid you not, that’s a real sentence for “put it where the sun don’t shine” in a nasty way. The Church is/are clueless idiots after more than 1/2 a millennium still. Yeesh.
Joseph Murphy
How ironic that the blogger pens a manifesto of 5th grade style insults to demonstrate how hateful and backward the Catholic Church is. Not to mention the arrogance it takes to believe that homosexuality is the chief concern of the Holy Father.
bab
@Joseph
Don’t worry, we all know that Ratzinger’s chief concern is dough…
bab
… power and little children.
Dallas David
Speaking of the Pope . . .
He used to run the Catholic Inquisition 10 years ago. Nowadays it’s called the “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” because of the bad image the Inquisition got. But minus the public torture, it fulfills the same function.
Here’s a curious article I found in 2001; I kept the clipping . . . it’s next to another article about a mosque that opened in suburban Dallas. Dunno if the surburban crazies burnt it down the next September or not.
Enjoy . . .
——————————-
From the Dallas Morning News, Saturday, May 19, 2001
SPANISH THEOLOGIAN DISCIPLINED FOR VIEWS ON SEX
Religion News Service
VATICAN CITY — The Vatican has disciplined a Spanish moral theologian for “errors and ambiguities” in his writing on such sensitive issues as homosexuality, masturbation, birth control, abortion, and bioethics.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that following a 3.5 year investigation, the Rev. Marciano Vidal signed an agreement to revise his work under supervision and to withdraw earlier editions from use in teaching.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the congregation, expressed satisfaction with Father Vidal’s compliance and urged moral theologians to abide by Pope John Paul II’s 1993 encyclical “Veritatis Splendor” on moral theology.
Father Vidal, a member of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, is the author of ‘Moral de Actitudes’ (Morality of Attitudes), ‘Diccionario de Etica Teologica’ (Dictionary of Theological Ethics) and a commentary on “Veritatis Splendor.”
Cardinal Ratzinger said the congregation opened an examination of the works after determining that they contained “errors and ambiguities — and because of the wide circulation of these books and their influence, above all in theological formation.”
In a “doctrinal note,” the German cardinal criticized Father Vidal’s views on Catholic dialogue with the secular world, bioethics, love, sexuality, and social morality.
Cardinal Ratzinger said the theologian attempted to employ scientific data and contemporary philosophy in dialogue “at the expense of essential aspects constitutive of an integral presentation of the church’s moral teaching.”
Father Vidal erred, he said, by finding birth control morally acceptable “in situation of particular gravity when it is impossible to have recourse to other means” and by arguing that homosexuals do not necessarily have to accept “the rigid morality of either becoming heterosexual or total abstinance.”
Cardinal Ratzinger said that Father Vidal’s view that “not every act of masturbation is an ‘objectively grave matter'” contradicts the church’s teaching that auto-eroticism is “intrinsically evil.”
The Cardinal said Father Vidal also distances himself from the church in accepting in vitro fertilization in some cases and makes “ambiguous judgments” on therapeutic abortion, including the statement that “not all liberalization of abortion laws is directly contrary to ethics.”
christopher di spirito
Pope Benedict XVI is now on Twitter. I wonder how long until he uses social media to attack gays? I give him a month.
Dallas David
@Joseph Murphy: Well, ya gotta agree that the Pope does dress funny, and he and his whole organization is against gay sex. Actually, it’s against un-Catholic sex.
I had no idea that the Catholic church regards masturbation as “intrinsically evil.” What’s up with that? Geez, no wonder they’re crazy. Nothing but single guys running the place, with the official policy being “no beating off.” That’s just bizarre.
And Ratzinger got upset because theologians use scientific data? Whoa! Shades of a Sun-centric Universe! It’s a good thing that Gallileo got his pardon back in the 1990’s, because this fool sure wouldn’t give him one, especially if he was right!
Christian theology has a corrosive effect on friendships, families, and basic morality. Here in the USA, Catholic Charities is the biggest charitable organization, but almost all of its funding comes from federal, state, and local governments. They weep and wail and gnash their teeth because the government won’t allow them to use taxpayer funds to discriminate against gays who want to adopt. So they close up their services completely. Well, tough toenails for them. Plenty of other agencies available to pick up their slack, and everyone’s much better off. Hooray for the NY legislators . . .
Crazy G.D. Christian theology . . . screws up people’s minds as bad as Scientology . . .
codyj
Love those outfits, pink beanies/shashes/ I could NEVER take those idiots seriously..sadly,tho theres ALOT of (sheeples) out there..the RCC down the road hasta have a law officer directing traffic there when church lets out,its THAT crowded….especially the 50s-80s crowd
the crustybastard
Ratzinger, your new iPad isn’t going to make you or your church more relevant.
You’re old enough that you’ll be able to savor the misery you’ve spread for the remainder of your life.
Your church, however, is on an inexorable decline because of miserable old reptiles like yourself. If you ever had a purpose, it was that.
And such was foretold, LOL. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophecy_of_the_Popes
B
No. 10 · Dallas David wrote, “I had no idea that the Catholic church regards masturbation as “intrinsically evil.” What’s up with that? Geez, no wonder they’re crazy.”
In fact, the Vatican’s position on masturbation is completely sensible if you think about it objectively as “Marketing 101”: the ideal activity to use for a guilt trip (in order to rake in the bucks) is something people can’t stop doing, and the Vatican’s business model is to make people feel sinful to create a market for “forgiveness of sins.”
Shannon1981
Great! Someone new to follow and torment on twitter. I’ve been rather bored there lately, the right wingers in my feed have been quiet ever since I told them Michele Bachmann compared herself to a serial killer, and that it was rather accurate. No good comebacks.
Thanks, Poop Benedict!
TehLonelyMon
Not to nitpick, but… if they used “gay” and “hell” in a tweet they would have 132 characters left, due to the space bar.