First, I am Catholic, and so is this other guy.
I responded to him and asked, "Do you remember how you felt when the first news about Catholic priest abuses in Boston broke, a couple of decades ago?"
He replied, "I was sort of numbed with disbelief."
"Okay," I continued, "and have you ever thought about how such a scandal could exist for so long, not to mention other scandals? Have you ever thought about the power structure at the top levels of the church administration that manipulated things to keep all the scandals a secret?"
"I guess I never thought of it that way," he replied.
"Well, " I said, "do you think that the the Catholic church is the only entity in the history of the world to have a power structure, and secret scandals, etc.?"
Silence.
"And so," I added, "by simple extrapolation, I am confident that a relatively tiny number of people in the highest positions among the governments, corporations and other institutions are all busy pushing their agendas, and protecting their secrets. And if that's true, it's probably just as true that an even higher level of controllers are orchestrating things to their advantage and to further their agenda."
Deer in the headlights stare.
Fuck I know. Catholics ate brainwashed into false idols and get mad when you ask where in the Bible it says to pray to Mary. They literally love their little denomination more than Jesus Christ. Who did not found the catholic church. His apostles did that so as imperfect humans we can't say that is the route Jesus meant for them to take. The apostles turned what Jesus did into a company and lost its grassroots features.
That wasn't the apostles. Rome did that. The head of Rome became the head of the church. Constantine is the big one who merged early Christianity with paganism to form Catholicism.
Sunday worship (sun worship)
Mary worship (Ishtar/Semiramus)
Christmas (solstice festival)
Lent (Semiramus wept 40 days in ashes for Tammuz)
Trinity (most pagan faiths have a Trinity)
Eucharist and wine as literal body and blood of Christ (human sacrifice is a major part of early paganism)
The Roman Catholic church is the harlot who rides the beast (Revelation 17).
Makes sense now. I've been leary of the apostles since the catholics tote that around like the church was ordained by Jesus himself. So they always resort to apostle Paul as the founder. I figured if this is what the apostles created then fuck that they got corrupt as soon as Jesus left. But now that you cleared that up I can read the apostles in the bible without so much criticism
Paul also warns about the corruption in Galatians 1:6 where he writes about false Gospels floating around (and to think this was happening just within a couple decades of Jesus' death - and of course, the corruption of Man on the faith didn't stop there.)
Downvotes confirm your over the target.
Thank you for the clarification.
Nah. Downvotes usually mean some possibly reasonable people disagree with you.
No deeper meaning than that.