I don't know if you are a Christian at all but today we have a new pope which personally I am very excited for. Just wanted to say habemus Papum!

1) Not all Christians have the Pope as head of their Church, in fact of the 2.3 Billion Christians in the world, only a little over half see Francis I as the head of their Church.

2) This man seems to be a clone of Palpatine... erm I mean Benedict. The same hard line stance, the same conservative rhetoric that for years has driven Catholics from the church and left Catholicism wallowing in the middle ages instead of the 21st Century. Bring back Jean Paul II.

Same-sex marriage, "is a destructive pretension against the plan of God. We are not talking about a mere Bill, but rather a machination of the Father of Lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the Children of God."

Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires

I'm a Serbian atheist, so I don't care for the Pope. :)

Raoul. In my opinion, the Church opinions rarely reflect those of the general population.

Check this one for instance.

Personally I don't care for any religions as I see them as nothing more than a cause for hatred and war.

I agree Tyrion, there is only one religion that has never has a war fought in its name.

I really wanted Morgan Freeman as the new Pope.

Wow. Thats a pretty strong statement there fella. Personally each to their own when it comes to sexual preferences.

I would like to apologies for my members arrogance, obviously he is still learning to hold his tongue if he has nothing nice to say, maybe ill cut it off?

This is not something that The Ancients stand behind and he will be expected to write an apology, I am very sorry for anyone who has been offended by this and I can assure you wont happen again.

I think everyone can understand that we all have our own views. Whilst some may see yours as misguided and offensive, it is afterall your view.

This is the outside forum, crew membership or game affiliations are null. Immobiliare has the absolute right to be as much of a bigot as he wish and I have only one thing to say to him: You, sir, made a complete ass of yourself. I am not sorry even in the very least if you take offense but hey, that's life, you get to live with your burden of being an ignorant fool.

Yes this is outside forum, I wanted to start heated debate between conservatives and liberals, However, I've rushed and got myself into trouble.
There is no open, non game related forum in this game. We must think 3 times before posting anything. 

The outside forum is completely separate to the role play element of the game. Here, you are not a member of Sephy's family, he is not above you in rank and he has no say over what you say or do.

Having said that, we are all still responsible for our actions. Posting a comment that will/could be viewed by many as wildly bigoted and inflammatory isn't a good idea in any location and could lead to significant consequences. There's a big difference between a heated debate (which I love - although I'd always tend to avoid it when it's related to religion as it's just too sensitive a topic) and generalised insults (be that based on race, sexuality or any other factor - which I abhor), a line that shouldn't be crossed without due care and thought and knowledge that it may have repercussions.

The thing is Silva that the church is and will not conform to the ideas of society no matter how right they seem. Truthfully bro its easy if people think that the church should be more "progressive" and allow same-sex marriage, priests to marry, women priests, abortion to be ok, or any other thing that CNN and FOX are converting people to then they will be fighting an opponent who wont back down. The church is not here for the feelings of others but for the salvation of souls. If the feeling is that the church is not right then thats on them. Now im not hating on anyone of any particular dilemma that the church stands against. The church is not behind the "times" as many like to call it. IN complete opposition the church stands against modern times. From Abortion, 27.5 percent of babies were killed in the year i was born due to some people calling it a "choice" instead of a life. Women priests are complaining about their lack of a role in the church and want to do more but Christ did not call women to be apostles and if he did people would have known. Priests to marry, a priest must be willing to sacrifice everything he has for the bride. If he is married and has children then obviously his own family would come before the church. The church is the priests bride. Same sex marriage, there is no procreation in gay marriage and the church does not hate or believe homosexuals are going to hell as so many believe. If one feels his life on earth is more important than his soul then let him gain the whole world. On Pope Francis, or Father Jorge as he is known in Argentina, is an unbelievable man. They claim he took a bus instead of buying his own car, lived in an apartment rather then owning a house, cooked his own food opposed to buying fast food. This man is exactly what Christ called back when he walked the earth. If he is like B16 then great! Benedict was one of the superior men in knowledge of the bible, history of the church, and life of Christ than most if not all christian leaders. On John Paul 2. He was not as progressive as the media play him out to be but he was more of what people wanted to see in the church. How many times did he speak out against corrupt governments, how many wars did he advise against, how many apologies did he give for the churches error not in teaching but in action? JP2 forgave the man who attempted to assassinate him and that is no doubt a man called by Christ. When women approached him about being priests he listened to their entire argument and still told them no. When people started talking about how lustful society is and how gay marriage should be legalized and accepted by the church he came out with Theology of The Body talks. In the end bro, the church will not stop you from doing what you wish to do. If you want to be a murderer or get married to the guy you like the church will not hate you and say you are the devil but will tell you that the life you are living is not a life of Christ. With that your soul becomes endangered. I hope you read this because that was a bit of writing ;)

I disagree with the rule that priest are not allowed to get married. If a priest who can put the church above is own wife and children then doesn't that show he is a more capable priest and dedicated to God than one not married? That being said why should a priest put the church above his family? If he had a family, had a wife and kids then wouldn't he be able to connect more with his followers when they seek council from him?

Also if priests were allowed to sleep with women and get married then I think the whole pedaphila thing going on would severely decrease. I guess a man who must forsaken all sexual pleasures gets a bit messed up in the head as you can only imagine after years of no sex. For me with no sex for more than 2 weeks I get grumpy.

Also if priests had to forsaken sex and a family and having kids then really I think only the priests who have had sex, maybe had a wife and some kids then decided to join the priesthood and have to forsaken them all. Then he would be the only one who would really understand what he is forsaking and if he can do it then he would be more dedicated than any priest today in my mind. It is easy to sacrifice something you have never experienced.

Also the ability of the catholic church to adapt to modern changes is the only reason is it around today. The inability for other religions/cults to adapt is what caused for a lot of them to severely decrease in or even disappear. That being said the more the catholic church differed from the original christianity has in my mind made it less pure.

Anyway....I don't believe in any religion :) Just feel the need to argue with hogan

Me too Macho. Me too.

On the Internet you can be anything you want. Its a shame so many people choose to be stupid.

The church constantly changes and conforms to society, just not the way it should. The first time they reorganised the bible, choosing books to drop, books to add, and in what order they should appear. The First Council of Nicaea helped law down church law, not biblical law. Priests used to be able to marry, but that was changed when married priests died, and their spouses tried to claim rights to property the priests looked after under common law. Where in the bible does it state that Man must use a intermediary to gain forgiveness from God? As far as I am aware there is only one requirement for entering Heaven, accepting Jesus as your saviour. For 2000 years the church has been making Moral changes to what the Bible instructs:

Hear now, you Episcopalians, give heed to the statutes and ordinances that I am teaching you to observe. ... You must neither add anything to what I command you nor take away anything from it.

Wives be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. (Ephesians 5:22)

Thou shalt not wear a garment of diverse sorts, as of woollen and linen together. (Deuteronomy 22:11)

These you may eat, of all that are in the waters. Everything in the waters that has fins and scales, whether in the seas or in the rivers, you may eat. But anything in the seas or the rivers that has not fins and scales, of the swarming creatures in the waters and of the living creatures that are in the waters, is detestable to you. You shall regard them as detestable; you shall not eat any of their flesh, and you shall detest their carcasses. Everything in the waters that has not fins and scales is detestable to you. (Leviticus 11:9-12)

You shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your cattle breed with a different kind. You shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor shall you wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material. (Leviticus 19:19)

Don't even start me on Abortion... Women have no right to have an abortion? Women, say, who are raped and become pregnant, or perhaps who's lives are endangered by the pregnancy, or maybe they carry a severely disabled foetus, or perhaps they are the victim of a paedophile or an incestuous relationship? Maybe they can't afford to support the child financially, or perhaps they are incapable of looking after themselves and therefore looking after a child is an impossibility. Should they all be denied abortions? Should the woman suffer so that the foetus can be brought to term? Then what? Into the care system? so that each year they have a less than a 1 in 10 chance of adoption? with that figure dropping every year older they get? A childhood without love, all because some idiot said you must be born?

And what do you mean the bible doesn't condemn Homosexuality? 'If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads. (Leviticus 20:13 NIV), 'Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.(Romans 1:26-27 NIV)

Seems pretty anti gay to me? If you have what the Bible terms 'unnatural sex' then you should be put to death does not strike me as a rounding endorsement. If we are to use the Bibles format as a template for marriage, then surely we should still be following that template? So that's 1 man, 1 women... oh and 1 man and his brothers Widow... and 1 man, multiple wives & concubines... 1 Rapist and his formally Virginal victim (Yes, under biblical law, if you are ugly as fuck, find a virgin, rape her, and you get to marry her)... then of course there is my favourite, Soldier and his virginal conquest. Yep, when America went to war with Iraq, every soldier had the right to carry of an Iraqi virgin, and force her to submit to him sexually and to marry him. Does the Church still enforce these rules of God?

As for women priests? Jesus did not draw his disciples from women so why should the church? Jesus didn't draw his Disciples from English men or Germans or Americans or South Americans. He choose only Fishermen and Tax Collectors. Should Priests therefore not have to be Jewish Tax Collectors and Fishermen therefore? The only reasons the Church never had Women priests is three fold. 1) Women in the 1st and 2nd century traditionally had 2 jobs, raising children, and prostitution. In fact every woman Jesus meets is a mother or a hooker. 2) Men didn't take orders from women, women were seen as the weaker, fairer sex, so how could they possibly rule over our Spiritual health? 3) They are the origin of original sin, first to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, and the ones responsible for tempting man to do so, so how could they possibly give men spiritual advice? Times have moved on, women are people, just like men, they are no longer second class citizens, and its time the old boys network of the Catholic church recognised this.

As for Christ calling Benedict, Francis or Jean Paul, what utter tosh. The holy Spirit does not select the Pope, man selects the Pope. If the Holy Spirit selected the pope, then all of the enclave would vote for the same man surely? Or are you saying that some of the council are in fact imposters, are in league with Lucifer, or perhaps that the Holy Spirit is indecisive?

The first Christians were Jews and as Jews they were obligated to keep the rules of the Old Testament. But when we began to admit gentiles to the Church, these rules became a matter of controversy. In order to become a Christian, did you have to take on the Old Testament law? It is a question of how salvation occurs. Are we saved - made whole - by keeping the law? Or are we made whole by grace through faith in Jesus Christ?

In Acts 15 the Church decided once and for all that the road to wholeness with God is not the road of law-keeping, but the road of faith. So in one fell swoop the council of Jerusalem, somewhere around 50 AD, decided to throw out Old Testament law as a binding Christian code. They also made an interesting compromise. They gave a nod of the head to the conservatives. Gentiles do not have to take on the Old Testament law, they said, but they must abstain from things polluted by idols, from fornication, from whatever has been strangled, and from blood. (Acts 15:19-20, 28-29) So again, no sex outside of marriage or for reproductive reasons only (Yes, Fornication includes sex for pleasure, no withdrawal, no contraception, no rhythm method, just sex purely for reproduction), no false idols and we are not supposed to eat blood or anything strangled! That was laid down by the first council of the Church. You can find it in Christian Scriptures! Did anyone ever teach you that? Was that in your confirmation class!

The only reasons the church has no say in my life is this. The separation of Church and State. If that hadn't happened, we'd still be punished under church law for Heresy, Blasphemy, breaking God's commandments. That and the fact I'm an Atheist... something else I'd be punished for if we hadn't separated church and state.

Jean Paul was 100 times the Pope that Benedict was. Typical of the Church though. Make a freedom fighter Pope, a Guy who put his life on the line, day in and day out, trying to bring freedom from Nazi oppression to his people, and what do they do? Replace him with a Nazi when he dies :S People defend him by saying he would have died if he had opposed being in the Hitler Youth, if he had refused to join the German army in 1944, so what? Is it not better to die as a free man than to live as a slave to tyranny and oppression? Would Christ have joined the Roman army and fought for it if it was compulsory? Did the early Christians surrender and capitulate when threatened with death for their beliefs?

John Paul went about things the right way, he took his time, and enacted changes over a long period of time, I only wish he'd had another 20 years. As for Cardinal Jorge...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/03/20/can-even-god-forgive-jorge-mario-bergoglio/

If nothing else he is a hard line Conservative who preaches a return to strict Catholic Doctrine and strict adherence to biblical teachings. The church needs to evolve, it needs to move with the times, otherwise it will start to disappear altogether. Church attendance is at an all-time low. Do you honestly thing Pope Francis preaching a return to Catholicism of the Middle ages will bring more Catholics back to the fold?

On the priests marrying part, orthodox priests are required to be married in order to be priests.

a) I'm not allowed to get married because women just don't like me.  That has never once made me look at kids the wrong way. 

b) God called Debra (a woman) to be a judge.  He also used Balaam's donkey.  Now, for the love of all things good and holy, please don't misconstrue what I just said.  What I'm saying is God can, and will, call whomever He pleases to fill whatever role He deems necessary. 

c) James 1:27 - Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

Someday people will learn to truly care for those who need them, and to keep their nose lean.  Until then . . . God needs a new PR firm other than just word of mouth.

I leave it for the religious''beans too handle myself.."" :)