Pope’s Foot-Wash a Final Straw for Traditionalist Catholics

[caseymoz]

104. The way you force your straw man is rude.

I won't answer your insistence that I have faith, because I've given you as complete a description of my thinking as I can, and you've rejected it. Your reiterating the point-- that I have faith, yes I really do-- is ineffective. It didn't work before. And it's not going to work now that I've made my reasoning explicit to you.

What I've said doesn't fit the Catholic narrative of what unbelievers believe and why they're going to Hell, so you've twisted my words into something you know how to rebut. It's the same rebuttal you started with when you chimed in. It's still just a declaration, not an argument, you've added no support to it. Fact is, you don't know how to answer what I've written, so you disregard it and tell me what I really believe. It's creepy. Sort of like records of inquisitions I've read, where the defendant answers the inquisitor's question, while the inquisitor tells him what he's really saying.

I really have nothing else I to say about that. You either can reread what I've written, or continue to reject it, but I won't be drawn into your argument that I have faith in no God.

I haven't a clue about why people believe in God? I've seen it enough. I've talked to people about it enough. I've had faith myself. I've listened to homilies. I have family members who have faith. I've been to Catholic religion class. I've been to Catholic retreats, and so on.

My conclusion from all of it: propagating a fear of Hell-- even subtly-- into young minds, is very effective to creating belief in God, especially when you add some social pressure about it, hidden or overt.

Of course, you're not supposed to believe in God from fear of Hell (except at last resort, if it works). However, God is watching everything, including your mind, and love is supposed to be your motive for faith. With that pressure, you're going to convince yourself to do things for the right reasons, and you're not even going to let yourself think you're doing it to save your eternal soul. You get used to this before you're in mid-childhood, knowing nothing else. Once the habit of believing is instilled, and you don't remember why you originally thought there was a God, then you're free to choose the higher motives for your faith.

And there are many levels of denial that allow this. It would be correct to say most do it for the higher reasons, because they truthfully believe that's why they're doing it. Therefore, yes, there are other reasons besides avoiding Hell for people to believe in God. (Believe in, rather than say, just believe a creator of some kind exists.)

But everybody has a unconscious mind, and it's likely not forthcoming to the conscious one. It's true of me, too. Give less credence to what people say about themselves and watch how they behave.