Shane, firstly let me say I want to thank you for your response. You no doubt know much much more about Catholicism than I do, I wouldnt dare dispute that (I had to google sacrement of the holy order, interesting). I do however still disagree with your assessment. I do not wish to appear to be attacking anyones beliefs so I will as briefly as possible explain the points you mention and will not return to those afterwards (allowing you the last word on those if you wish it).

to my saying I know one nice catholic... I only know two (that i know of), one is a douche and the other is a smart young woman studying to be a doctor (albeit a little weird).


1. Well thats still much more worship than JW's give the gb. I have never heard of anyone praying to any member of the gb, in fact ive heard it very much discouraged. I agree the gb is looked up to greatly, but I disagree they are worshiped anyway as near as the pope. All one must do is watch any of the popes appearances, watch how the crowds react, he is a living god to many of them. And he can be prayed to (as you say posthumously if 'saintified'), but never can a jw pray to a gb member. So I really do stand by that.

2. Well thats just not true, the pope explicitly says so http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20070711/news_1n11church.html both say the same when it comes to salvation, it can only be through their ONE only true chruch (organization).

4. I disagree its not harmful. Perhaps you do not know of any who had to face such a circumstance but very many people have been traumatized thinking their unbaptized baby is in limbo. It is an extremely destructive flip flop with much emotional and mental harm coming from it. Many Catholics are so traumatized they refuse to accept the new stance on purgatory even though it is sanctioned. 

5. But they have no choice, according to everyone they are "catholic". They were given no choice and were put in the default position of affirming a faith. This I see as an issue. But even if I didnt see it as an issue, it still is similarities to the jw faith. You might not agree with me that its destructive but surely you see both practice baptism of those too young to know any better.

6. Yes and many JW's resisted hitler as well. It doesnt change that they both at one point in some way offered support to hitler. I would mention the hitler youth thing not being as big a deal being that he was forced into it as all german youths his age, but there is still a parallel.

So Shane, I see you do not see these things (with the obvious exception with the child abuse) as real serious issues and you objected mostly based on this. But I was not trying to raise that they were (even though I do think they are). I was simply saying there are similarities and for the most part as per your responses it seems (to me) you agreed (although Im not sure youll agree to that). Ill go further now however and say that many of the same reasons we (or rather, I) discredit JW's we (or I) can use to discredit Catholic faith. Now an important point, I could make this thread and make similar lists for jws and almost any other religion, so its not just Catholics.

Ill add one more to the list that I was reminded about from another post. The belittling of women. Neither jw's nor catholics can have women in any high position. One may argue its because the bible says so, and sure Ill agree the bible is masochistic but its still a parallel. And notice I say parallel and not "exactly like."

Im not attempting to bash Catholics because if I was, the first thing I would mention is the Vatican's stance that while AIDS is a bad thing, its not nearly as bad as condoms. Thankfully this is not something JW's preach (yet).

The Dude Abides