Thoughts on the Catholic Church

To be clear, I am not Roman Catholic nor do I agree with much of Catholic teaching or doctrine.  However, I have been impressed with much of what I have seen of the new pope.  Pope Francis, from all appearances, displays humility, service, and humanity along with a desire to cautiously clean up some problem areas.

Things have not always gone well for the Catholic Church. Certainly with a 1.8 billion membership worldwide (about 17% of the world’s population), the Church is both an easy target for criticism and a statistical magnet for problems.  Yes, we can point an accusing finger at the Catholic Church and make claims of genocide, robbing and plundering of cultures, naughty nuns and pervert priests, and the dispensing of bloodied knuckles in Catholic schools.  But, the Catholic Church has a long history caring benevolence as well as order maintenance.  Care needs to be taken to distinguish between acts done by Catholics in the name of Catholicism and actions taken by the Catholic Church.

Certainly, not everything sanctioned by the Catholic Church has lived up to the Christian ideal, but the same can be said for every other denomination and sect.

It is nice to see Catholics taking pride in their church, which is something that seems to have been diminishing over the years—at least from my view as an outsider.  And, it is good to remember that the Catholic Church has dispensed a tremendous amount of good around the world.