Liberals, Pope Francis and the Torture Debate<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"So we have another article reflecting the Left's understanding of Pope Francis and how he will ultimately change the Catholic Faith. Again, most are\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2015\/08\/liberals-pope-francis-and-the-torture-debate.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Liberals, Pope Francis and the Torture Debate\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"So we have another article reflecting the Left's understanding of Pope Francis and how he will ultimately change the Catholic Faith. 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{"id":1290,"date":"2015-08-30T11:56:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-30T11:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2015\/08\/liberals-pope-francis-and-the-torture-debate.html"},"modified":"2015-08-30T11:56:00","modified_gmt":"2015-08-30T11:56:00","slug":"liberals-pope-francis-and-the-torture-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2015\/08\/liberals-pope-francis-and-the-torture-debate.html","title":{"rendered":"Liberals, Pope Francis and the Torture Debate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

So we have another article<\/a> reflecting the Left\u2019s understanding of Pope Francis and how he will ultimately change the Catholic Faith. \u00a0Again, most are no longer imagining that Pope Francis will stand on high and personally overthrow Catholic Doctrine. \u00a0But they are becoming aware of a Catholic principal that has been crucial to the Catholic Blogosphere and those who defend the here and now of awesomeness without trashing the history of the Church. <\/p>\n

Remember the Torture Debates. \u00a0This was a major, and I mean major, debate about torture in light of the whole Waterboarding controversies of the Bush administration. \u00a0For my part, torture is wrong. \u00a0It\u2019s what the bad guys do. \u00a0Just like removing offensive facts \u00a0from the public forum and erasing them from our collective memories. \u00a0It\u2019s what the Nazis, the Communists, the Indians (yeah, really), the Vietcong and all those other baddies did. \u00a0It\u2019s not what we should ever have done.<\/p>\n

So I was against torture. \u00a0But I enjoyed the Catholic debates. \u00a0Those Catholics who, for whatever reason, were trying to argue for the Bush policies often looked back to the darker periods of Church history when, to be honest, people were tortured by Church command. \u00a0How many were tortured is tough to say. \u00a0But one person tortured in the name of Christ by Holy Mother Church is a travesty. \u00a0If you want to believe millions were, go ahead. \u00a0Given Catholics on the blogosphere who believe the worst about the US or Western Civilization, I\u2019m more willing to accept the inflated numbers. \u00a0But that\u2019s irrelevant. \u00a0People were tortured by the Church. \u00a0It\u2019s a fact. Let\u2019s move on. <\/p>\n

And yet opponents of the practice were quick to point out the Church never actually officially doctrinally proclaimed a dogma about torturing people. \u00a0Therefore, you can\u2019t say the Church actually taught it was OK. \u00a0What the Church did was irrelevant to what the Church actually, officially, doctrinally taught. <\/p>\n

See where this is going? \u00a0The fact that the Church raised armies, launched wars, slaughtered heretical sects, tortured people to death was irrelevant. \u00a0That it happened over the course of centuries was irrelevant. \u00a0That was just the times. \u00a0The Church \u2013 Official Church Doctrine \u2013 never changed. <\/p>\n

Explain how that brings comfort to anyone who died at the hands of the Church during those years. \u00a0Tell that to anti-Catholics who bring that back at the Church time and again. \u00a0It doesn\u2019t matter. \u00a0Because if in the old dusty law books, the Church still taught turn the other cheek, in all the world that Catholics and the human race knew, you defended Christendom with the sword. <\/p>\n

And that, children, is just what a growing number of liberals are expecting. \u00a0Pope Francis won\u2019t change Church Doctrine. \u00a0Just like the Medieval Church didn\u2019t officially alter the whole \u2018Love your neighbor as yourself\u2019 teaching. \u00a0It redefined it. \u00a0It rethought it. \u00a0It turned it on its head to allow armies and inquisitors to do the unthinkable for countless centuries. \u00a0And just like that, the growing liberal conclusion is that Pope Francis will do the same. \u00a0God will forever have declared that a man should leave his parents and cleave unto this wife and the two shall become one flesh. \u00a0But in the day to day living of Catholic life? \u00a0In the new understanding of who is awesome, and who simply isn\u2019t keeping with the times of where Beautiful Catholics should be? That sign proclaiming the old teaching about marriage between a man and woman will hang right above Ted and Ted as they tie the knot in the corner Parish and Commons. <\/p>\n

This growing number of liberals might be wrong. \u00a0But we\u2019re waiting for some clear indicators from Pope Francis to make it obvious that they are wrong. \u00a0And at least as of now, not seeing them.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"