The Pope, No Thanks.

The Pope, lovely fella (allegedly), a man with a hotline to god, a man whose word can influence millions of catholics, a man I really don't want in this country with his antiquated values and morals.

Where do I start with this blog? Well lets have a look at popes from the past first.

"If my own father was a heretic, I would personally gather the wood to burn him" Pope Paul IV

"Mussolini is a wonderful man. Do you hear me, a wonderful man" Pope Pius XI

"One Galileo in two thousand years is enough" Pope Pius XII (more about him later).

And lastly the current pope Benedict XVI

"Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is more or less strong tendancy ordered to an intrinsic moral evil, and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder"

Back in the middle ages the pope was the real power in Europe, having influence over most of it, his word was treated as the word of god and what he said - went. So we had crusades that cause division and animosity to this day, inquisitions, burnings, invasions, papal bulls, edicts - they all happened. It seems to me that even though society has moved on and developed, the papacy hasn't. I say the papacy because there's much more to it than just the pope, and all past popes cannot be culpable.

Let's go back to pope Pius XII. Though there is quite a lot said in favour of this pope but you don't have to dig deep to find that this pope, the pope during the second world war and after could have made a difference but chose not to. This pope had favourable relations with the Nazi regime, but during the invasion of Poland he decided to keep silent, tens of thousands of Polish catholics died and catholic monks, 2,500 (aprox) were detained in concentration camps. Pope Pius's refusal to censure the invasion of Poland still strikes a raw nerve with some Polish catholics today but it gets worse, much worse. Ante Pavelic, the new leader of the Nazi puppet state in Croatia formed during the war went on, with Vatican approval to forcibly torture, convert and kill on a mass scale the jews and orthodox christian Serbs in their territory. So large and cruel a concentration camp that was set up by Pavelic and his Ustashe party henchmen in the town of Jasenovacs that even the Nazi were reviled by their actions. Of course later in history Yugoslavia erupted again with the Serbs seeking revenge in what was called 'ethnic cleansing' which was really 'religious cleansing'.

In 1942 when there was evidence of mass killing and concentration camps Pius turned a blind eye to it, even when his own people such as Monsignor Montini (the future pope Paul VI) told him that 'massacres of the jews reach frightening proportions'.

In 1944 on meeting Winston Churchill it was pope Pius who tried to get Italian war criminals off the hook by saying they shouldn't stand for trials as they were victims of the Nazi regime.

In fairness the catholic church did save many Jews during the war, some had to convert to christianity, some were kept safe in religious establishments throughout Europe.

In closing this bit, Pope Benedict now wants to make Pope Pius XII a saint, madness!

Back to the middle ages, fortunately this Isle managed to shake off catholic yolk and control from Rome but not without a few hiccups. After Henry VIII died his daughter Mary came to the throne, married Phillip II of Spain and began reversing her fathers work and embracing catholicism again. Come 1554 England had a Spanish king and was subject to Rome once more, then it was time for the burnings of protestants to begin, Bishops, poor people et al. Just before being burnt at Oxford, Bishop Latimer turned to Bishop Ridley and said "We shall on this day light such a candle by god's grace as, I trust, shall never be put out". The burnings in Smithfield where most suffered horrible deaths was actually a turning point, and eventually led to the return of England to a protestant nation. Catholic horrors were still being perpetrated abroad though, the Spanish inquisition, catholic purges in the Spanish occupied Netherlands and atrocities in the New World.

Today in Edinburgh as the pope made his opening speech or should I say gambit of the tour it wasn't long before he was having a pop at the rise of secular states. If old fools like this were in charge we'd soon be back to the middle age values and the thinking back then. I wouldn't be able to type blogs such as this because of the fear of persecution or even death. An example of how far the catholic church hasn't come is this, in 1996 the Irish republic held a referendum on whether its state constitution should still prohibit divorce. Fortunately Ireland has increasingly moved towards sensible secularism and most political parties urged people to approve of a change in the law. They did so, for several reasons, they no longer thought it right for the roman catholic church to legislate the people on their morality. There was also thought that there would be no reunification in Ireland if the mainly prostestant north were repelled by the thought of clerical interference and rule. But one of the main reason was nobody should be trapped in an unhappy marriage, especially if it was a woman with a continually drunk husband that would beat or rape her - I'm sure you get the picture. Despite people having common sense on the vote the catholic church flew in such big names such as mother Theresa to campaign for a 'no' vote.

Personally I find catholicism regressive, self serving, self indulgent and fundamentally backward in its values (sorry catholics, as I know you aren't all bad and I have catholic friends) but that is my view. This is a faith that lets you give your wife a beating but you can atone for it with a confessional. Forget confessionals, just make sincere apologies for the bad things you've done or to the people concerned, see... easy, and the human thing to do. This is a pope and faith that advise people in the third world not to use condoms, in fact that condoms are a weapon. More people die of aids in Africa and many other catholic countries and its alright by the pope, common sense doesn't come into it. When you look at Ireland both main factions prefer sectarianism as this divides communities and fuels old hatreds but the catholic hierarchy there like this, as it can influence children in clerical schools and continue fuelling religious hatred. In such a divided society the populace are easily monitored and its easier for the church to extend its controlling hand.

It always intrigues me why catholics make a big deal of the virgin Mary, revere her in such a sycophantic way. The virgin birth is clear proof that man is capable of creating a legend, a legend not to dissimilar from other eastern faiths, Horus of the Egyptians being born unto a virgin to mention one past figure. There's no recorded birth of Mary in the bible but later of course she is singled out for special treatment and visited by the archangel Gabriel and told of things to come. How ironic later in the bible that she seemingly has no memory of this or angels telling her she is the mother of god. Later after Jesus is born according to biblical accounts she seems surprised at everything her son does, why is he talking to priest's in the temple? You'd think a Mary would have a memory of why Jesus is important.

More interestingly, later in the new testament Matthew tells us in 13:55-57 that Mary had several kids, that there were 4 brothers and some sisters too, hhmm not very virginal. Later we have James telling us in his gospel that Jesus had a brother by the same name (what!?) who mixed in religious circles ... would the real Jesus please stand up?!

Amazingly the doctrine of the immaculate conception didn't come to being until it was announced in Rome in 1852, and later the dogma of the assumption in 1951.

Back to the pope Benedicts visit. There seems to be fluctuating statistics on the cost of it all but the general figures seems to be 12 million of taxpayers money which is shocking really, the Vatican is so rich that it could easily afford to fund the pope's visits but I guess as we're the hosts we have to foot the bill, large thanks go to Mr Tony Blair who I believe had something to do with inviting him to some degree. You can argue as a nation we do pay for other dignitaries to visit but most of these are diplomatic figures and I would assume trade talks are always on the cards, so this is of benefit. It's fair to say though the papal hierarchy and the vatican aren't short of money, papal personalities such as the popes private secretary, the smooth Georg Ganswein dubbed 'gorgeous Georg' by the Italian press likes to play tennis and fly planes in his spare time.

British catholics are paying £25 to see the pope at various venues in the UK, if the catholic church was so benevolent why isn't it paying for the facilities and hosting it free?

Getting back to Pope Benedict, this is a pope that doesn't want progress, doesn't want to release details of child abuse within his church thinking his own people are above secular law. This is a pope that fears secularism and practical thinking, this is a pope that knows there are prominent clergy within the catholic regime who deny the holocaust.

I think it's warming to know that so many great people within British society, celebrities, scientists, authors and philosophers are speaking out against the papal visit. This is the great thing about secular democratic societies, we have the freedom to think and speak openly without fear of theological recrimination. Personalities such as Stephen Fry, Richard Dawkins, AC Grayling, Polly Toynbee, Peter Tatchell (his documentary on the pope was brilliant) and veteran author Claire Rayner have all spoke of their dislike of Benedict.

For me though it was Andrew Copson, chief executive of the British humanist society that phrased things so well, that the papacy 'use their powers to make peoples life worse'. People such as the woman from Manilla that Peter Tatchell interviewed with a large family, and getting larger as she was pregnant again. She said she didn't want to have more kids because she was struggling to feed her existing ones but because of her faith she couldn't use condoms and the local priest said she should have more children, shocking.

In closing, the pope isn't a kindly old fluffy man, he's a man that could make a difference to millions, especially in Africa but chooses not to. In fact he chooses not to do a lot of things like hand details of thousands of cases of child abuse over to secular states.

I want to end with a quote from Thomas Paine, English born American author and revolutionary.

"The world is my country, all mankind is my brethren, and to do good is my religion"

The fact being you don't need religion to do good.

Why I Don't Do Religion, Part 1

I was born in the late 1960's and in retrospect I was glad I made my debut on earth during this era. When I refer to this era, I mean a time when technology was advancing at break neck speed, attitudes were becoming more liberal and people were beginning to think more openly.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet though because closed minded spectres revered in books long from the past still had firm root in modern day societies thinking. People were still using religion to control others, channel their thinking and play on conscience en mass.

As a kid my childhood was fairly unremarkable but contented. I was a sickly child with an overbearing protective mother and a pragmatic father. We were a working class family and I remember my parents striving hard for many things and toiling long hours at a local factory. I spent a good deal of time with my grandparents on the next road who'd had an even harder working class upbringing.

My parents and grandparents didn't really do religion, occasionally my gran would show old copies of the bible she'd received from previous generations but that was about it. I suspect my mother was open minded and a little spiritual, she kept a neutral stance on it really whilst my father never really mentioned it. They were though both of the opinion that should I want to discover faith later on I was free to do so but they would not foist it upon me and have me baptised. It was to be my choice later in life, an informed choice when I better understood such issues and the gravity of it all.

My education began, the curriculum of course contained elements of religion. Most notable in those early years was the daily assembly where all the pupils gathered, sang songs and said prayer. In those formative days though I didn't understand some of the biblical words and references but I enjoyed the communal feel and the chance to sing, in my innocence I paid little attention to the bigger picture and meaning. Occasionally through those early years vicars would come in and do the preaching bit and organisations would visit yearly and give us small versions of the new testament as gifts. I tried reading it but made little sense of it.

On to middle school which was pretty much the same routine, as my thinking developed and my ethics and conscience grew it became apparent that I often thought about the consequences of things and if the big man upstairs was watching - so I began to fear him a little. To be fair I wasn't an overly bright youngster, in my infant years I could tell the time at an early age and was good at writing but I was terrible at maths and probably had dyscalculia (dyslexia with numbers) to a degree. Later at middle school I only tended to be good at subjects I was actually interested in, these mainly being history, English and ironically on joining middle school - religious education (R.E). In the first year of middle school the curriculum was set before we could choose our preferred subjects the following year and R.E was one of those set subjects, as it had lots of (as I then thought) historical elements I embraced it, plus I really liked the guy that teached it, who was also my form tutor. I recall getting 63% in the exam, more than anyone in my class and my form and R.E teacher urging me to continue with my studies but something happened around that time that made me rethink things and change my perspective.

I can't recall in detail the whole of events but most of it has stuck with me to this day. I was approached walking home from the local boy scout's group one night by a local man who'd visited the scout hall for some reason or another. He told me he was setting up a new youth group and wanted some young responsible people such as myself (yeah right!) to help out and would I be interested? Of course I was young and impressionable not to mention flattered to be asked. I was a little knowledgeable of this man, and so were my family as he lived fairly nearby and worked for the local newspaper. So, I went along with him the following week to the new youth group. In his car I pressed for details of what the group would involve and what we 'd be doing, he seemed evasive in his reply. I recall being taken to a large house on the outskirts of town and on entering found most of the group were younger than me, and all of them seemed polite and amiable, almost too accepting in a sense. We were then told we were going to watch a film on video, to much excitement, as video was the brand new media of the day. The film turned out to be a christian one, preaching morals at every turn and demanding worship and obedience to the big guy allegedly upstairs. The film tried to be subtle but soon became a blatent moralistic christian affair with little doubt regarding the message it was conveying. Elaboration would be pointless here as I am sure you can imagine what such christian films contain. I felt unnerved, awkward and didn't want to be there. Then after what seemed like the longest film ever we were asked to kneel and pray. I went along with it and mumbled wanting the whole experience to end as it didn't feel right, in fact it felt uncomfortable.

On the way home I was the last to be dropped off in the car. The man who'd organised it and asked me along stopped short of my house and wanted to chat. There's no doubt he was charismatic and very eloquent as I recall but he also seemed to be pressuring me between the nice white teeth smiles. It was coercion to say the least and even a young and impressionable mind knows when something doesn't feel right. I told him I wasn't sure I believed, something didn't feel right about it all and perhaps the group wasn't for me. He didn't like that and became more firm, playing on my emotions and mind with subtleties and word play. I wasn't an adult and probably therefore couldn't debate or argue well, I just knew it felt wrong, slightly sinister and at the earliest opportunity I made my excuses and left the car telling him I wasn't interested in attending again. I told my parents who were concerned but also proud in a sense that I'd made my own mind up on such things, they also told me to avoid the guy in future and were not best pleased about things but as nothing wrong had occurred there was no need for confrontation, just for myself to be aware next time I guess.

From that moment on began my questioning of religion albeit in a quiet personal way.

I also recall a guy in my class at school, a quiet yet witty lad by the name of Darren. His parents were Jehovah's witnesses and I remember in R.E class he wasn't allowed to participate, just to read his own JW bible, he also wasn't allowed to do some activities or attend assembly. I would often chat to him about how he felt about his faith, the fact he couldn't indulge in things at Christmas with us all etc. The answers I got were that he felt miserable but he had no choice but to follow his fathers wishes until he was older. My heart really went out to him sometimes as he sat there alone in the class with only his JW bible to read as we went and had fun doing various things. Shortly after leaving school I saw him again and he told me he'd turned his back on it all and felt he had his life back again. Hopefully he was now free to explore life without the controlling restrictions of religion.

I've had a few encounters with Jehovah's witnesses since and of course now I am an adult and can debate with clarity and conviction but what annoys me about them is they always seem to have children or young adults with them when they visit, great leverage really as nobody likes to vociferously argue whilst younger people are around. In my last encounter with them, an older man who constantly quoted from their version of the bible was accompanied by a lad of 16 or 17 years, smartly dressed and looked a bit like David Beckham. After some debate I turned from the old fool and asked the young lad with glazed eyes 'why aren't you out doing sports, chasing girls and living life to the fullest whilst you are young and in your prime?' There was no reply only a worried expression, he didn't want to step out of line obviously. I just find it all very sad that young people can be seemingly brainwashed with lies and conscience eroding stories that have little truth or historical fact at all. You can be a good person without any religious prattling.

I appreciate compared to others that may have had staunch religious upbringings at Catholic schools or similar, my experience of faith or religion hasn't been too full on, though I suspect many of those people never took things too seriously at times either and questioned things too.

As for the rest of my younger years, I decided to pay little attention to religion and live my life, enjoy what it has to offer as it is beyond doubt in my mind that this is the only life we have, as there is no proof of an afterlife, that is just wish thinking on mankind's part. It's only in these later years I feel I need to be outspoken about the wrongs of religion and that people should be free to make their own choices and be allowed free thinking without having to be subjected to dim rhetoric and fables from the insular times of the past.

The bottom line for religion and young people is that in my opinion we don't need it. Parents can instill perfectly good morals, discipline and the difference between what is right and wrong without any religious influence and doctrine, it's that simple. To threaten children that there is a big bogeyman upstairs watching their every move and they could go to hell if they don't conform to the word of others in effect in my opinion a form of sublime mental thought control and a form of child abuse that sadly is tolerated in today's society by millions.

Lace Market District

I pass through the Lace Market in Nottingham almost on a weekly basis, it's an area of Nottingham I really like. It kind of feels like a small town within a city. It's home to lots of old types of buildings and architecture, corporate business, bars and colleges. When I stroll through there in a morning it's fairly quiet and to say it's in a busy city has a certain serenity about it.

Anyway, here's some photos I've taken recently of the lace market area when passing through.

Hawking

Stephen Hawking is a genius of our times, a man of considered rational thoughts and despite his frailties has heroic qualities, I'm sure the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche would have considered him an 'Übermensch' who embodied the better qualities of mankind, much like Wagner who Nietzsche idolised (but never saw eye to eye with).

Hawking is indeed one of the great scientific thinkers of today and although I personally can't understand some of the stuff he writes (I was never good at maths, physics and chemistry) I try and take on board as much of it as I can.

The last few days have seen most newspapers in a science Vs religion debate, letters pages have been filled with arguments, counter arguments and at times vitriol (most of the vitriol being from the religious kind).

Hawking has stated that 'Science leaves no room for god in the creation of the universe' and of course this has rattled the religious establishment severely. The Times front page today shows rabbi's, imams' and archbishops et al venting their displeasure at such a statement and also projecting their warped reasoning's. Of course these are the people who are happy to believe people can live till several hundred years old and that Adam named all species of the earth in genesis (I'm guessing that could of taken some time!).

Personally I am glad the gloves are off against organised religion at the moment, that people are questioning things with rational thought and scientific processes. It's about time mankind took more steps to shake off the old fetters of religion and myths laid down by ignorant men long ago (I'm starting to sound like Bertrand Russell here) and stride into the future with open logical and sensible minds.

I'm not against people having faith, as I can see what a comfort blanket it can be and some faith's such as Buddhism do have wise words but I am wholeheartedly against organised religion that seeks to control minds and lives with the fear of fairy tales. Reading the Times today it seems that religious powers that be are united in protecting their chosen faith's when the irony is they cannot agree on a singular faith at all.

If mankind had invested more energies and time in knowledge, learning and sciences instead of biblical scaremongering and pointless wars then my guess is we'd be travelling the stars right now and cancer would have been a long forgotten thing of the past.

I've long been planning a blog (possibly a long one) on my experiences and thoughts on religion. I've made some notes and ideally I need to type it up first, and probably edit it several times but hopefully in will be posted at some point in the forthcoming weeks.

September

September has arrived and what a lovely day it was to begin the month. It's always a bitter/sweet month for me in some ways. I love the late summer feel and warm but not overpowering temperatures but on the downside September will always be a month that I remember losing my mother.

This morning as I stood at the train station waiting for the train to Nottingham I felt positive as a hot air balloon drifted lazily in the distance. I felt upbeat and invigorated by the chilled morning air. As it turns out it was a good day, lots of thinking, lots of smiles and a fair bit of time between projects in Nottingham to be happy in my own company in the sunshine.

You'll have to squint a bit to see the balloon in the distance.