Chamblee54

There is a controversy about Catholic orgainizations being required to offer contraceptives as part of health care insurance. This is a rather strange flap, which seems intended to score political points. The non Catholic PG (which should not be confused with PC) has a few thoughts.
PG will never be a Catholic. The business of claiming to believe something, while living your life another way, just does not make sense. Maybe there is a mindset which allows people to be happy with this custom, but it simply does not work for PG.
There is an oft repeated claim that 98 percent of Catholic women use birth control. Get Religion has a festive post about the silliness of this claim. It really doesn’t matter what the numbers are, the point is, a lot of Catholic women are doing what they want to do, and ignoring the Pope.
There is also the issue of employers being responsible for the health care expenses of workers. Many feel that there should be a one payor system, and others feel that individuals should take care of themselves. The concept that an employer should enforce archaic beliefs on their employees private lives is puzzling.
The Catholic Company starts with an ancient text. Men, wearing funny hats, interpret it for the followers. Another text based religion, Islam, is having some weird scenes these days. The birthday of the Prophet was celebrated recently, and Hamza Kashgari decided to send a happy birthday message . The government of Saudi Arabia is not amused, and Mr. Kashgari might die.
It is tough to imagine why these messages are offensive. These are English translations, and the Arabic original may be tougher. Also, it is not known what the clerics were telling the faithful. Once a message starts to “go viral”, it’s meaning can change. PG heard a radio broadcast on the Catholic controversy, where they said the Church was now required to hand out abortion pills.
Jesus and Mo have not discussed the matter of the forbidden tweets. (Rumor has it that the barmaid thinks Mr. Kashgari is cute.) They did post a sign this week…We politely request that you refrain from laughing at and/or joking about our religious beliefs.
Pictures today are from the Atlanta Beltline, taken November 11, 2009.