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[–]Jacinda 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

The Catholic Church undoubtedly in a bad way. From the review of Frédéric Martel's book, In the Closet of the Vatican: Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy:

The moral fraudulence of the church is Martel’s subject: ... he establishes that during the past few papacies the fieriest critics of homosexuality – the cardinals who regarded Aids as a divine judgment, condemned the distribution of condoms in Africa, called gender theory an abomination, and ignored peccadilloes like those of the Cuban priest who administered a special blessing to the penises of little boys – were themselves unabashedly gay.

Some of them cruised in Roman parks, claiming diplomatic immunity whenever they were bothered by the police; others used their smartphones to summon Arab hustlers. Many attended infernally red-lit orgies in the Vatican, with party drugs and strapping seminarians on tap, and quite a few rejoiced in drag-queen nicknames. One financially canny episcopal plutocrat added Rome’s busiest gay sauna to his bulging property portfolio. Martel includes a single incongruously heterosexual anecdote, about a prince of the church who died of a heart attack in Paris while having over-energetic sex with a prostitute called Mimi. Jesuitical spin doctors claimed he’d paid her a visit in the hope of persuading her to repent, which didn’t explain why he was naked when the ambulance arrived. [Cont...]

Martel is obviously unsympathetic but the portrait he paints is pretty grim. I feel sorry for the average parishioner having to deal with the fallout from all this or a priest who is trying to do his best, given the circumstances.

cc: u/Dragonerne