i cant believe you have deluded yourself into thinking Catholicism is morally correct because you watched a fictional movie about popes hahahahhahahahahha have fun worshipping homophobic gold-hoarding sexual predators hahhahahahhaha hey quick tell me whether the catholic church allows women to be priests❤️
I can't believe you're miserable enough to go out of your way to anonymously message me on Tumblr from what was supposedly a Twitter discourse lol.
Anyway, I have no idea who you are and likewise you don't know anything about me beyond some tweets you've probably have seen.
I was an atheist for 10 years starting in high school during the height of the Catholic Church sex and corruption scandals and have been vocal and critical about it since, so you don't need to patronize me about that as if I never heard about it.
I was raised Catholic, went to Catholic school for 14 years, and being Catholic is a major part of my cultural identity as a Chinese Indonesian who lived through the ethnocide by the government whether I agreed with its values or not. Even when I was an atheist, being an (at the time) ex-Catholic was still a huge part of my identity and nothing could have changed that. I am a Catholic first, and ethnic Chinese second.
The main reason for me to become a practicing Catholic again is simply because I now believe in the existence of God, and that happened through a spiritual experience that was personal to me where I felt His presence at work. Does it make sense? Probably not, high school me would've been skeptical and debated the shit out of it just like how I was debating the nuns and teachers at my school. My favorite book at the time was Dan Brown's Angels & Demons and Robert Langdon's quote always stuck with me:
"Faith is a gift I have yet to receive."
I suppose a decade later I finally received the gift of faith. With that faith came curiosity about whatever I had missed out on since I left the Church and somehow was stuck in an extremely abusive company that turned out to be an Evangelical cult for five years and escaped.
I learned about the changes that Pope Francis had brought since he became pope, which was the same time I left. It gave me hope that things can change for the better and the problems are being addressed. I found out that there is a wealth of knowledge from 2,000 years' worth of Church history and theology that I wasn't aware of before despite my high school self being so proud of the knowledge that I possessed over my peers, which is one of the biggest reasons I'm deep into Catholicism. I am simply a nerd.
I'm an ex-atheist, of course I still have my skepticism towards organized religious institutions. I am understanding and sympathetic towards people who are non-believing--atheists and agnostics alike--and I would even defend them in front of religious people because faith isn't something you can force yourself or others to have and that plenty of people suffer from religious trauma and that their trauma is 100% valid. At the same time I've suffered through what disorganized religion was like and how worse that was when there is no guideline and the leader could interpret the Bible just as she pleased.
My approach towards Catholicism is more similar to how one might approach Buddhism: I take the teachings of Jesus as a way of life above anything else. Even when I was an atheist I still thought Jesus was at least a cool guy. That was how I got into Liberation Theology, because it sought to dismantle the imperialist element of the Roman Catholic Church.
I never claim that the RCC is without sin, it is obviously full of it throughout its history and I'm sure you already know that. I even disagree with many of its current stances, most of all matters that pertain women (marriage, bodily autonomy, our roles in the Church--in fact I could write a whole essay on the topic) because there is a systemic flaw of clericalism ignoring our perspectives and lived realities. But again, I love Jesus. That's enough reason for me to still be in the religion because I put my faith in Him instead of humans and seek to follow His teachings as best as I could and work on bringing change for the better just like Pope Francis did in the past couple of years before his passing.
Like it or not, faith and religion are a huge part of human life, especially when you live in the Global South. The world is a different place than it was a century ago after all the coups and sabotages that the US orchestrated and you should understand that in some places of the world, non-theism isn't an option. Using religion as a bridge and buffer for revolutionary ideas is in some cases the only way to go, and there have been many religious organizations and people who are active in the revolution.
So I respect your views and opinions, and if you are coming from a place of trauma I see you and understand you and hope that you may one day heal from it. But all I ask is for you to extend that same grace to people who have different beliefs and opinions than you.
