The French Government has just told its Ministers on vacation in southern France to keep away from the corridas. The Powers That Be are under enough attack as it is without exposing themselves to criticism about their blood-lust.
I am not going to open Pan’s or Dora’s box here and defend or attack the noble, beautiful, barbarous, inhuman art of bravely and esthetically taunting, torturing and sacrificing bovine gladiators which even if they win are moritori, but which would have been slaughtered anyhow. I just want to ask whether there is any point in arguing the point, and apply the same question to the raison d’être of this Blog.
By their fans, Richard Dawkins or Cardinal Pell may be declared victor in one of their debates (a.k.a. dialogues of the deaf), but no one expects either protagonist to be won over by the other’s arguments. I can’t imagine anyone convincing anyone else that they are wrong about bull-fighting. So why bother ? For the audience, of course ! It’s Entertainment. You don’t have to enter the arena yourself; you don’t even have to ask a question. You can just enjoy the show and watch Richard and George – Frank and Jim – try to score points. The reason we do it, of course, on the Tube and in the Blog is, more importantly, for the undecided. My guess is that there are few Believers on the Brink when it comes to bull-fighting, but their name is Legion in the domain of God, faith and religion. I have never heard or read a new argument pro or contra the corrida, but I would like to think that some of my Reflections about blindfaithblindfolly here offer, occasionally at least, teasers and ticklers not previously formulated in quite the way I do. Only readers can tell me whether I am wasting my time and theirs.
RIDENDA RELIGIO
Blind Faith: Blind Folly 
Thank you for your welcome Frank.
You should thank your lucky stars that you live in our times when freedom of speech, at least in the western first-world countries, is regarded as a right.
Had you lived in an earlier time you would surely have burned brightly as did other vanities on the bonfires lit under them by the agents of God.
Giordano Bruno burned brightly.
You, like Hans Kung, can sleep soundly.
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We no longer have free speech in Australia. It is a myth to think otherwise.
Only speech, judged as politically correct in a ‘tolerant’ society is’ tolerated’ by the ‘tolerant’.
Punishment includes loss or downgrading of employment and even prison sentences, even for defending long practiced and accepted Western traditions.
Our national broadcaster can, on the other hand, groundlessly mock a critic by disgusting cartoon and poster, suggesting he performs vile acts of bestiality with a dog, while a senator has been forced to the back bench for suggesting that once the definition of marriage is broadened to include homosexual unions, it will progressively be broadened to other relationships and eventually perhaps bestiality. Precedence suggests that this is factual, whereas the ABC broadcast incident is groundless vindictiveness.
As for burning, I suggest a balanced look at history, as well as the one way persecution of Christians by godless regimes in the last century, and the humanitarian work of Christians, compared with negligible efforts by the Godless over the decades.
Please give us a break from brainwashed myths.
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One wonders what Jim hopes to achieve by forgetting or disguising the past. As Georgie has reminded us Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in Rome because he denied the authority of the Catholic Church. It might be an uncomfortable truth for Jim but it is truth nonetheless. And Georgie was making the valid point that Frank would have also been burned at the stake had he lived at that time.
I have previously stated that Christianity and in particular Catholicism has morphed into a less confident and less militaristic version of its former self. We can only be thankful for that.
Sadly the extremist elements in militant Islam are causing justified concern globally – and with their access to modern weapons and methods of mass murder they are capable of atrocities that make the murderous history of past ages of Catholicism pale into relative insignificance.
But the past should never be forgotten – its mistakes are thereby repeated.
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I don’t deny the imperfect and scandalous in behaviour by some Christians in following the perfect example of Christ .’Murderous’ is quite an exaggerated adjective, as is the degree of claimed atrocities in many historical accounts.
Apart from militant Islam, the only modern accounts of atrocities are by the Godless, as you well know ; and these dwarf any past charges against Christianity. We are talking of hundreds of millions of innocent lives in totalitarian countries over the past century. Score: Atheists hundreds of millions, Christians, zero..
And today, are you ashamed that the only unified defence of the unborn is from Christians. It’s easy to pronounce moral judgement against others, of past ages, while denying shame for allowing killing of the defenceless in our own suburbs.
As Georgie said, it is unproductive to look back and compare numbers. We should be appalled now in our own land in our own time.
As you noticed, the Catholic Church is going through a period of challenge, as has recurred many times over the millennia, at one stage around 70% went into Arian heresy, with the majority of bishops. But, the promise of Christ prevails and the Church survived by divine guidance. We Catholics know not to worry about survival, even though we see the secular world in the process of accelerating self destruction. I think this has been prophesised.
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With due respect to Jim’s sensibilities I maintain that the deliberate killing of a human being because he/she disagrees with you is murder whoever does the killing and whenever the killing is done.
Whilst Christianity and in particular Catholicism no longer support the murder of its opponents Jim seems to be missing the essential point.
The problem is “religion” and the belief in “God”. The tragedies unfolding in the Middle East have their roots in differing views about “God’s” revelation. Religion is the problem. Hence Frank’s mantra
“Delenda Religio”.
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There are some who believe that World War Three has already begun. It will be as bloody but even more vicious than its predecessors and will last a lot longer. There will never be an armistice. Total annihilation of the enemy will be the objective shared by both sides. The opponents : Islam and Christianity. Its “roots”, as Thom reminds us, are “in differing views about ‘God’s’ revelation”. “Religion is”, indeed, “the problem”.
Such remarks will no doubt provoke accusations of my being a prophet of doom, an agent provocateur, an Islamophobe as well as a Christian apostate, gloating that Hitchens warned us. I do have a solution, but it will, of course, never be implemented. Both sides will continue to insist that God is on theirs and millions will be massacred to prove they are right. God help us !
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