Quote Originally Posted by Bruno View Post
Well I am, if only because you cannot actually stop being a catholic. At least according to the church.
Once you're baptized, your soul belongs to them . The only thing you can do is stop practising catholicism.
You can be excommunicated (which is kind of a reverse baptism) but that is a severe punishment that is / was only used in the most extreme circumstances.

It was considered worse than burning at the stake, because in that case you still got your afterlife if you repented. Incidentally, that was the whitewash argument for torture. Catholicism hinges on confession, guilt and repentance. So if you were tortured for a couple of days you would regret having committed your sins.
Thus you'd confess (if only to make it stop) and repent, and your soul was saved from and afterlife on the bbq. (hey I am not making this up)

The way the pope is defining new sins has raised an interesting point for me.
If it wasn't a sin when you were doing it, will you get punished for it?
If it wasn't a sin earlier, then why would it suddenly affect your afterlife if you did it aftyer it became a sin? What if the pope was wrong (infallibility is rarely invoked these days).
What if that sin gets repealed later on because it wasn't actually so bad? Do the people in purgatory suddenly get a note from the administration, saying 'An administrative error has been made. You will be transferred to heaven shortly. Here is a voucher for a free bowl of porridge.

It also works the other way around: what if someone did something then that is considered a sin now? If someone happily torured people under absolution from the pope, and then went to heaven, did they get transferred to hell when the church acknowledged that the whole inquisition was a bit over the top?

...



Ok sorry for being OT.
Thats pretty much the exact same questions Martain Luther had some while back. His resolution of the question is basically that....The pope can't make up new sins. If it ain't in the bible instituted directly by God man can't decide its a sin, of course the ten commandments we have are pretty comprehensive