Mike Thomas: If this is a mark of the very best you can do to engage in normal dialogue I will refrain from reporting it as highly insulting and offensive. In fact your comment remaining here serves a purpose: it reflects the general tone used referring to the Pope and the RCC, a tone that rarely displays anything more than cynicism, cliches, random references to Fr Ted (careful now, down with that sort of thing, another cup of tea fr, another Mass will do it, the holy stone of Clonrichert etc etc,) and down right ignorance.

Blasphemy !!!!!’

They need to be purified by a big kick in the arse…..

The Catholic Church is a bastion of corruption and hypocrisy that’s caused untold suffering for centuries and continues its evil today. If people opened their eyes and had a “normal dialogue” about its role in the world I believe they’d burn the whole establishment.

What would you do, Stephen? Have him nip down to the nearest Cash For Gold?

I’ve have him order Diarmuid Martin’s Dublin diocese sell their shares in the Bank of Ireland worth €10m, to start paying their compensation – you know, that 1.5 BILLION bill they have left the public to pay instead:

As for their millions in shares in banks alone: http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/bondholder-nuns-sharedealing-priests-and-their-market-habits-3147023.html

@Stephen: Does the Catholic Church not feed the starving poor?

@stephen while sitting on his golden throne. I swear I read something in the bible where Jesus (he is the main dude) got pretty pissed about these guys worshipping a golden calf(irony?)…… Yes other guy he should nip down the cash for gold. No good feeding hungry Africans only to tell them silly shit like aids can be cured by abstaining from pre marital sex, loving Jesus and shunning contraception. When you are sitting on mountains of gold,priceless art and real estate that can be sold to help the poor. Let’s just play hide and seek with monstrous paedophiles….. A game at which you are slowly losing

@Jonno: The problems in Africa, you seem so well versed in, will not be solved by flooding the place with condoms; as it is already. Its a fact where healthcare programs are based on respect for the person and fidelity in relationships are run the HIV rates fall. (eg Uganda) Sure condoms are used, but its just not possible for condoms to solve the problem; if it were the crisis would be over. Its the catholic church who is providing most of the help on the ground to those suffering and dying from the illness you so glibly refer too.

Er Condulmer, That’s not the reality on the ground..nThe other halfs father works all over the developing world helping people to become self sufficient and start farms / businesses – sustainable growth in a sense..nnHis two pet peeves from his work? Monsanto and the Church.. nnHe said in every run down place he goes to in Africa there’s a church, and there’s a pressure upon the congregation to give as much as possible to the collection plate (like here before the boom), while the priests live like kings, big cars, nice houses etc..nnPeople give almost everything they have (because that’s what the church preaches), and most of the money they manage to make for themselves, the church profits from.. How exactly is that helping? nnNot to mention certain church affiliated charity agencies pay no heed to where their money goes and pay little to no attention to follow through, they just hand the money over to a rep in the country and that’s it – meaning it gets diverted and doesn’t reach those it was intended for, my partners father had to cut the funding to a certain church affiliated aid agency for this very reason..nnYeah, they’re doing sterling work there in Africa.. Hats off to them..

@Shanit: er, having worked with NGOs, not organised by the Church, the Catholic Church is indeed extremely involved in the development of communities in Africa. In fact the Church has been more effective in local development than secular NGOs because they are ‘on the ground’….to the annoyance of some. Two examples: an Irish priest working in a very remote area in Cameroon single handedly organised the community to develop a water sanitation scheme funded 100% by a local community in the midlands. He tried numerous other agencies to get minimal assistance to no avail. The village has clean water for the first time. A nun (Franciscan) in the slums of Kamapala established a ‘compound’ (as they say) with a hospital for Aids suffers, a school and an orphanage for their kids. She (in her 70s) lives with 3 other nuns (one english, 2 Ugandans) in nothing more than wooden huts; funded by the Irish Catholic Church. The same is replicated all over Africa and Latin America; no doubt there are chancers that are on the make; but by God there are countless others who have given more than I could in two life times for the people ‘on the ground’. I’ve seen it.

sorry: Shanti, pardon typo.

As part of governmental engagement with the congregations, a three-person panel, chaired by the man who is now chairman of the National Asset Management Agency, Frank Daly, was set up to assess the resources held by the 18 groups. The report from this panel, published in November 2009, gives a fascinating insight into the financial position of the orders and the challenges they face.

The assets declared by the 18 congregations had a total value of €3.743 billion (mostly based on valuations made for insurance reasons). The property declared did not include all the assets held by the congregations.

The Sisters of Mercy, one of the more wealthy orders, told the panel it had land and buildings worth €1.032 billion, and financial assets (cash and investments) of €183 million. The order had liabilities and commitments of €204 million, meaning it had net assets of slightly more than €1 billion. These are its assets for the Irish Republic only. It has further undisclosed assets in Northern Ireland.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2012/0606/1224317368627.html

I think they can afford to part with a gold cross or two – to pay conpensation to their victims?

Quote:

World’s Biggest Stock Broker
The Catholic Church, therefore, once all her assets have been put together, is the most formidable stockbroker in the world. The ‘Wall Street Journal’ said that the Vatican’s financial deals in the U.S. alone were so big that very often it sold or bought gold in lots of a million or more dollars at one time.

Therefore, the Vatican was, and still is, the most redoubtable wealth accumulator and property owner in existence.

http://www.cai.org/bible-studies/vatican-billions

177 million more acreage of various lands owned by the Catholic Church throughout the globe,

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-biggest-landowners-2011-3?op=1#ixzz1zC1ElWAQ

But wait…

http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/7004/evilmoney.jpg

Lol, classic stuff. And so true

Seems to me like molesting kids is a viable and prosperous career path were no one can call u out and take ur cash

God is a real estate developppperrrrrrrrr

@ Dave Harris

“God is a real estate developppperrrrrrrrr”

…And a porn magazine owner too!

See: http://www.worldcrunch.com/catholic-church-makes-fortune-german-porn-business/3995

“Weltbild,” Germany’s largest media company, sells books, DVDs, music and more — and also happens to belong 100% to the Catholic Church. Few people knew about this connection until this month when Buchreport, a German industry newsletter, reported that the Catholic company also sells porn.
A Church spokesman responded: “Weltbild tries to prevent the distribution of possibly pornographic content.”

Well, it’s prevention efforts have apparently not been so successful. For more than 10 years, a group of committed Catholics has been trying to point out what is going on to Church authorities, and they are outraged at the hypocrisy of the spokesman’s statement. In 2008, the group sent a 70-page document to all the bishops whose dioceses have shared ownership of Weltbild for 30 years, detailing evidence of the sale of questionable material.

It wasn’t the church, ’twas the divil made them do it, and us cover it up.

He’s a delusional man in a delusional organisation that will never understand that they are the ones that are sinful under the definition of their own word .

They have some balls suggesting the world is against them and their little fantasy world . ;-)

If any cooperate or ltd company came out with the bullshit and vile hatred they spew constantly , they would be charged with incitement to hatred . The fact they are protected as a religious cult by law saves their holy bacon all the time .

Also let’s all live in a fairy tale of unicorn dolphins that live in rainbows

I think that was tried before…wait, stay with me…..Henry VIII and the dissolution of the monasteries up and to including the penal laws…and ya know what…..thousands of Catholics were slaughtered in the process!

ouch! the irony!

Dude your not supposed to touch the hot part on the bottom, press it on clothes them turn off

Mrs. Doyle: What would you say to a lovely cup of tea father?nnFather Jack: Feck off cup!!!

Dude your previous comment was absolute bollox. But this one, Allah be damned if I didn’t laugh

that’s one big brush of tar you got there…

Rubbish!

respect should be earned… but that’s just my opinion

not rubbish! (that should be sufficient!)

If you can tell me one thing he has done that warrants respect Kilkenny i will gladly give it ??

ur lost in the churches bs

Exactly!!! Respect the man for christ sake, imagine it was your job to cover up decades of horrible disgusting deplorable acts of child abuse from the public!! He’s goin well convincing people. If I was him, with the unbelievably overwhelming proof I’d just admit fault! But he carries on like a trooper of a made up pedophile deity an continues to pretend

Utter rubbish!