Times: Yawn! Here we go again

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141021/blogs/yawn-here-we-go-again.540637
Tuesday, October 21, 2014, 11:39 by Alison Bezzina

Can you imagine if a multi million dollar global company had to declare that no matter how good its female employees are, no matter how qualified they get, no matter their experience, their skills and talents, and no matter how hard they try, they will never, ever, ever be promoted to the highest echelons of the organization, simply because they’re female?

Now imagine if in addition to this blatant and baseless gender discrimination, the same organization came out and stated that its gay employees are not entitled to the same benefits or treatment as the rest because, they are intrinsically disordered.

And imagine if the same organization said that whilst it will do its best to avoid discrimination, divorcees within the company will never be on the same grounds as the rest.

And to top it all off, imagine if, just to save face, the same company said that it will do its very best to have mercy upon such people.

Can you imagine the uproar, the law suites, the shock horror on people’s faces?

Then why is it that just because it is the Church that’s saying it, there’s no uproar, no reaction, but just more of the same shoulder shrugs?

Last week, news headlines reporting the church’s synod read as follows:

Seismic Shift in Rome: New Catholic Church Document

Vatican proposes 'stunning' shift on gays, lesbians

First Synod Report creates a New Gospel: Homosexual Orientation must be "valued"

A pastoral earthquake at the synod

These headlines were thanks to a draft report which was issued halfway through the meeting. It called for greater openness towards homosexuals and divorced Catholics who have remarried. But, as expected, at the end of the day these parts were not approved and in fact, were even removed from the final text.

So, Pope Francis suffered what is being dubbed as a setback to his proposals, and this week the headlines read:

Catholic synod: Pope Francis setback on gay policy

Setback for pope as synod fails to agree on gays, divorcees ...

Catholic bishops veto gay-friendly statements leaving Pope Francis the loser

Admittedly, I whilst I was hopeful, I can’t really say that I’m surprised with this outcome; I don’t think anyone really is, especially not the Pope.

Perhaps it’s because liberals have long lost hope in the church and have already walked away from its teachings.

Others on the other hand have simply learnt how to live with the church’s close-mindedness on such matters - they pick and abide to the parts they agree with, they live with the parts they can just about tolerate, and they ignore the parts they don’t like.

Religion a la carte, at its best.