Monday, April 15, 2013

The Hypothetical Progressive Pope

I’ve been trying out hypothetical as a way to show believers where their beliefs originate. The best example I’ve worked out is directed specifically toward Catholics. I ask:
If a future Pope reversed the Church’s position on gay marriage, would you also reverse your position on gay marriage?
The word Pope could be substituted for “religious leader” to make this less Catholicism-centric, but the Catholic Church is fairly unique in that it’s doctrine trumps even the Bible in the eyes of its congregation. Seeing how the Pope is the infallible spokesperson for the Church, his word matters immensely.


Now, let’s look at what the possible answers mean. If a believer who opposes gay marriage answers in the affirmative, they show that their assessment of morality and their opinions of what is or isn’t discriminatory are based solely on authority. Whatever the Church thinks is how they think. The Pope is the Borg Queen in this scenario. If the believer instead says they would maintain their opposition of gay marriage against the Church, then we can know for sure that their belief is in fact a product of their own reasoning--at the cost of being a "bad Catholic."

Neither option is at all palatable to the believer, so if you pose the question, expect a refusal to answer. Most often I get, “the Church would never change their position so the question is moot.” That may be, but claiming certain knowledge of the future is a childish dodge for people with a distaste for hypothetical. Nevertheless we can’t force an answer out of them. This isn’t the Inquisition. (Speaking of which, poor Galileo would say that the Church sometimes, eventually, changes their position.) Simply posing the question is enough for the believer to formulate an answer, even if they see the trap set for verbalization. Consider the point made.

14 comments:

  1. Are you there Euthyphro? It's me, the pope.

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    1. I should probably get that reference.

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    2. It just reminds me of a conversation I get into when arguing about the euthyphro dilemma. "what if god had said stealing was good, would that be moral?" etc. This is similar with the pope in place of God. I'm not sure why I put it that way, it made me laugh yesterday but now I'm not sure I get it.

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  2. I agree that the Church would never change their position, but it puts believers into an uncomfortable spot, where their beliefs directly conflict with their desire for in-group conformity. I think this is especially true of Catholicism over other Christian groups because many Catholics not only see Catholicism as their religious denomination, but as their social group as well. It's a lot easier to walk away from a denomination than to give up your social stature, even Richard Dawkins considers himself a social Catholic.

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    1. Yeah, Catholics have the conformity blues.

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  3. Speaking from the position of one of the "worst" of Catholics, the ban on gay marriage is a "regulation," not "dogma," therefore the position could be changed...and if we ever got a progressive Pope who would finally be honest enough to declare himself to be gay, it's possible, though since the ban on Catholic clergy marrying is dogma, and can't be changed, hum. Galileo is entombed in a Catholic Church in Florence...so yes, sometimes dictators do change their minds.

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    1. I thought the same thing when I visited Galileo and Michelangelo's final "resting" place they share, wondering how they would feel about being entombed in a Catholic Church as a venerated "tourist" attraction, after the way the Pope's treated them during their lifetimes.

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  4. Yeh the catholic church would never change their stance on anything lol. Besides condoms and gay marriage, I wish they would change there stance on pedophilia.

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  5. Raises good questions. There are practical consequences to both approaches (that is, central authority versus more liberal / diverse view of inspired interpretation). Catholicism has split essentially into only four groups: Coptic, Eastern Orthodox, Roman, and Anglican.. Protestant denominations are legion (and in only a 500 year period; and individual congregations break up with even greater frequency). Hmmm ...

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  6. BTW...the nineteenth century Pius Pope who declared Pope's were infallible was one of the most fallible, mentally ill, abuse of power, Pope's in Catholic history...his flock wanted to throw his body in the river when he died instead of giving him a proper funeral.Us "bad" Catholics truly have a wacky history to debate.

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  7. The difficult thing about talking even hypotheticals with Christians is that they have so many backdoor logical fallacies that they can utilize to argue their point and/or escape or nullify the argument. That includes the ultimate trump card: "Because God said so."

    Ultimately, I've come to realize that you can't fight irrational with rational. Irrational always wins because, by its very definition, it doesn't have to make any sense.

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  8. @Anon,
    Hmmm... Blast of inspiration (perhaps): You can fight irrational with rational, but it takes a (rational) third party observer to recognize it. So just keep making those arguments, but bring a friend?

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  9. I don't think this ihypothetical question can not be answered. It is possible that this could in fact happen. However, there are other issues that would have to be addressed that would make this highly improbable. First of all the leader of the Catholic church is Jesus himself. The Pope is an earthly leader, but authority does not end with him. The Pope's job is to lead the faithful according to the teachings of the bible. We know from Lev. 18, Lev. 20, and Gen. (Lot) that homosexuality is not in accordance with God's plan; therefore, even though a Pope has authority on Earth, it is not his job to change the teachings which God Himself has laid out for us. Because even a Pope must answer to God at the end of his earthly life and is held accountable to the fullest extent of God's judgement as a spiritual teacher. Hope that answers a bit, but this issue is really vast.

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