Something that's got me burning up right now is the condemnation of American nuns by the Pope and the Vatican because they've haven't been pro-life enough and anti-gay enough. Ya' see, they've been spending too much time on those radical feminist practices of ministering to the sick, poor and downtrodden of society.
How dare they!?
As someone who monitors the media closely and has a healthy level of cynicism about all organized religion, could this possibly be a way for the Vatican to deflect attention from the ongoing pedophile priests scandals and the coverup of their existence by every level of the Catholic Church?
I mean seriously, American nuns? What do you think they're doing? Going out during Mardi Gras and flashing their boobs for beads? Chug-a-lugging beer every time the Pope says a Hail Mary? Encouraging little girls to strip down their Barbies and make porn movies with them?
Um no. Last time I looked, American nuns were doing everything that the holier than thou men at the Vatican weren't doing.
I'm not Catholic. I'm not religious. But I do respect people's religious beliefs and contend that if someone wants to live by particular religious tenants, have at it. That's supposed to be what freedom of religion is all about.
My problem is a bunch of old men in Rome and elsewhere telling women who are doing good for society that they aren't being true enough to the Catholic Church and therefore deserve to be reprimanded in the most public and humiliating way.
Some might say, well that's what the nuns signed up for when they joined the church. If they didn't want to live by church tenants, they should have figured out other ways to serve the community. You may be right about that, but the fact is, these women are doing more for the community than any of those old men in Rome busy counting the Vatican's money and figuring out ways to recruit more "faithful."
To me, what many American nuns are doing is exactly what ministering and service means. Helping the poor, the sick, and people who have no where else to go.
Every organized religion as far as I'm concerned is about maintaining control of women. Back to the dawn of time, men had to figure out a way to blunt the irresistible sexual power they saw that women had over them. What was the best way to do that? Create a religion that makes woman second class citizens and deems any sexual activity or desire as dirty and their fault. Oh and that also makes any knowledge or control of their sexuality or their bodies as sacrilegious.
It's institutional misogyny in the guise of religious doctrine.
How do I know? Because if God didn't tell me to comb my hair this morning, he sure as hell didn't tell the Pope, or any other church elder of any religion for that manner, to tell me what to do with my body.
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