Pope Benedict Criticizes Atheism in Encyclical

This past Thursday, I railed against Pope Benedict for paying lip service to preventing AIDS - one day before World AIDS Day - when Catholic doctrine is strictly against the use of condoms.

Today I almost sharted when I read the story about Pope Benedict's Encyclical attributing the "greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice" ever known to atheism, citing Marx and Lenin. It is followed-up by the Pope's "self-critique" of Christianity:

"We must acknowledge that modern Christianity, faced with the successes of science in progressively structuring the world, has to a large extent restricted its attention to the individual and his salvation," he wrote. "In doing so, it has limited the horizon of its hope and has failed to recognize sufficiently the greatness of its task."

Yes, that piss-poor, job-interview-esque "what's your greatest weakness" of an answer is what the Pope considers "self-critique" of Christianity.

I reiterate what I wrote to the Pope concerning condoms and AIDS: How fucking dare you?

How about the treatment of non-Christian Romans after Constantine adopted Christianity? How about the Spanish Inquisition? How about the burning of witches? How about Hitler was raised Catholic and did continue belief in Christianity during his killin' days? How about that self-critique? And since Popehat is specifically targeting atheism, how about all the wars in the history of the world that were fought, not because the other tribe or ethnic group or country didn't believe, but because they believed something different?

I'm not very fond of organized religion, but I recognize the value it has in billions of lives and the potential good that it can do. And while I see Catholicism specifically as an anachronistic, non-bending, slowly sinking ship in the 21st Century, Bill Donahue take note: I do not hate the Catholic Church. But for the Pope to state that atheism is the cause of pain, war, tragedy, and horror in the world past and present is like King Henry VIII of England berating Bill Clinton for his indiscretion, and is way beyond the scope of pot/kettle territory.

The Encyclical, appallingly entitled "Saved by Hope," can be viewed online at the Vatican website.

So shame on the Pope and shame on AP Reporter Victor L. Simpson for (writing the article and) blindly being his mouthpiece.