Once upon a time, many years ago, I was taking a
short flight from Bali to Singapore with my,
eventually-to-be, ex-wife. She was sitting at the window
and I was in the middle seat. We waited some minutes and
almost the last person to board came and sat down next
to me. He was a Roman Catholic priest, from
somewhere in the middle of America, who had been in some
far flung part of Indonesia bringing food, education and
Jesus Christ to some people who probably liked all
three.
He showed me photographs of schools, clinics and
happy smiling people, some probably praying that Jesus
would let them get back to their lives, many quite happy
that Jesus actually cared about them enough to give them
food and teach them to read.
After we had talked about his work, or I should
probably say, His work, I asked the priest if it would
be OK to ask him a question which had been worrying me
for some time. ‘OK’, he said, ‘go ahead.’
I asked him if it was true that the
Roman Catholic church was probably the world’s single
richest organization; knowing that they have churches
smothered in gold, pious devotees giving them masses of
cash for nearly 2000 years and vaults under the Vatican
filled with treasures looted from history. He replied,
‘Yes, that’s probably true.’
‘OK’, I said, ‘Would you also agree that
The Catholic church has been responsible for more human
suffering than any other organization, what with the
wars in His name, the denial of contraception and such’.
‘Yes’, he replied, ‘That is also probably true.’
‘OK’, I again replied. ‘Penultimate question. Doesn’t
it say in the Revelations that the Devil will come
arrayed in purple and gold, the colours of
the Catholicpriesthood?’
‘Yes, it does say that’, he replied, slightly less
confidently than before.
‘Doesn’t that all go to prove then, that the
Roman Catholic church is the Devil?’
He immediately snapped his head around to face
forward and completely ignored me for the rest of the
journey. Unfortunately we still had to take off so I had
a very uncomfortable two and a half hour flight to
Singapore next to a man who thought I was the
Devil!
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