Where the Rubber Hits the Road

This is an old joke by Emo Philips, once ranked as the funniest religious joke of all time : Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region....

Philip Mathias of The National Post blog writes today that there are two Catholic Churches; essentially the church of believers and the hierarchical structure of the Church. The allure of this duplicitous argument is that it opens the possibility in the minds of believers that they can attack one while remaining faithful to the other. Alas he undermines his own argument by proceeding to venture into the realm of defined teaching of the Church (Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, infallibility of the Holy Father in matters of faith and morals) and denouncing them as simple constructs of the hierarchy of the church. In doing so, he breaches his own arbitrary division of the church into two forms by questioning what the church actually believes and equating it with the malfeasance of Bishops who improperly dealt with the spate of sex abuse scandals that have been exposed in the past 20+ years. Whereas it is possible to offer criticism of the hierarchy and remain united with the Church ...