A new Pope has been chosen - Pope Francis, and for many people the question is what are his moral standpoints.
Well unfortunately for anyone hoping for progressive morality we can immediately discount several changes one may have hoped for.
Homosexuality:
He unsuccessfully opposed legislation introduced in 2010 in Argentina to allow same-sex marriage, calling it a "real and dire anthropological throwback".
Unsurprising that he holds this view, but once again detrimental to the Catholic Church which is already seen as immoral and victimizing by many, including myself.
Abortion:
He describes the pro-choice movement as a "culture of death" and is again opposed to allowing abortion in any form. Again unsurprising since this is the view of most Catholics. Unfortunately again an outdated model of victimization and immoral doctrine.
Contraception:
Surprisingly, he has always been against this. Its sad because this was one area that he could have really shook up the status quo, and progressed forward. Many Catholics already routinely use contraception and accept it, but his history set him down the wrong path a long time ago: He publicly opposed the distribution of contraception in Argentina and included it as part of the aforementioned "culture of death".
Same sex adoption: While he fails to see that its child abuse to tell children that if they don't believe in God they will go to Hell, he asserts that same sex adoption is immoral and "a form of discrimination against children." How sad that the facts reviewed by social scientists working in the area show him to be incorrect.
Evolution: The new pope has not given a position on his view of Darwinian Evolution through Natural selection, so we can only guess at this stage to his position. At 76, it is unlikely that whatever his position is will change so when the facts come to light, we can only assume that the direction taken by the Church will not alter until the next Pope.
In summary, the key points that some of us were hoping may be addressed by the new Pope are in fact remain incorrect, immoral, victimizing and inhumane. Its sad that the Catholic position cannot progress beyond 16th century morality, but also serves as confirmation that a belief in the Catholic doctrine is something that needs to be avoided if you are in any way concerned with being a morally just person.
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