VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Roman Catholic Church has effectively buried the concept of limbo, the place where centuries of tradition and teaching held that babies who die without baptism went.
In a long-awaited document, the Church's International Theological Commission said limbo reflected an "unduly restrictive view of salvation," according to the U.S.-based Catholic News Service, which obtained a copy on Friday.
The thumbs-down verdict on limbo had been expected for years and the document, called "The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptised," was seen as most likely to be final since limbo was never formally part of Church doctrine.
I really don't get this goofy shit, sorry. Let me get this straight -- this document, which effectively repudiates something which "was never formally part of Church doctrine" in the first place, was "long-awaited"? By whom, exactly? Intellectual self-flagellators who spend their entire lives chasing their tails over bits of informal doctrine? Wouldn't medication be cheaper, quicker, and more effective?
In writings before his election as Pope in 2005, the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger made it clear he believed the concept of limbo should be abandoned because it was "only a theological hypothesis" and "never a defined truth of faith."
Wow. Talk about your divine tautologies. It's all theological hypotheses, and the severe logical and definitional contradictions of the phrase "truth of faith" make me want to reach for a bottle of anything.
I'm glad they finally got this pressing non-issue off their plates. So these souls who had been, for 2000 years, falsely consigned to this now-imaginary place -- do they now retroactively inhabit another imaginary place, or are they grandfathered in, or what? I believe there may be property issues and rights of transference to be addressed by the Vatican's legal department.
Imagine the protests from beyond: "I was mistakenly stuck in limbo for two millennia when I was s'posed to be in purgatory!". I mean, does it count as time served or what? And if limbo does not exist, then it never existed, right? And if it never existed, where were all those souls all this time? You see the epistemological dilemma they're faced with here.
I think there's another long-awaited document in the offing.
4 comments:
I wanted to say something, but you already said it all.
I really need to get to work starting my own religion. Why am I busting my ass seven days a week when there are masses of people with more money than brains who would just love to give me some of it?
Oh, you think that's bad, check out this fucking clown. Who are these bozos giving him half (another article claimed 50-80%) of their income and tattooing "666" on themselves?
Just when you think people can't possibly get any stupider, they go and prove you wrong.
Ok, that tears it. Here's the plan; I'm offering you a chance to get in on the ground floor.
I'll go around to local historical sites like Monticello, Ashlawn and Montpelier, gathering rocks, dirt and other miscellany. We'll sell 'em in little baggies, under some sort of premise that sleeping with them under your pillow will give you the brains/rhetorical eloquence of a Jefferson, Monroe or Madison. I can probably even head north a couple hours to Mt. Vernon and get slivers of Washington's cherry tree or something to that effect. We'll be lighting cigars with hundred-dollar bills before you know it.
Substitute "historical artifact/dirt" with "crap you find in your backyard", and "give you the rhetorical eloquence of a Founding Father" with "enlarge your shriveled penis", and you have yourself a guaranteed money maker.
Still, I do like the idea of a sucker game for wannabe intemellectuals. Plenty of smart people out there with no common sense.
Post a Comment