Kid asks the Pope of his non-believing father is in Heaven - General

Catholics don't believe in interpreting the Bible literally.

Oh yes they do

They believe the Bible is 100% true, but they, along with basically every Christian alive, doesn't believe the whole thing is made of literal truth. There's lots of truth found within figurative language like poetry, analogy, metaphor, etc.

They believe that parts that are clear allegory are allegory, but then that goes for every christian, they still believe it is the intended word of god and more importantly that the moral philosophy is inspired of god himself.

Do you not know what fundamentalism is?

Of course I know what fundamentalism is, I grew up with it, but even they could tell the difference between metaphor and intended history. Revelation, for example, isn't taken as literal by any christian group, pretty much all know it is allegory, same with many of Jesus' stories. However the parts clearly intended to be taken as history, like Genesis, Exodus, Kings etc are taken as gospel and even the catholics take such books as literal truth. There is some interpretation on things like what is a "day" in genesis, but that's more down to hebrew translation debate and not a lack of fundamentalism. Catholics aren't hard fundamentalists per se, however they do still take the moral guidance from the bible as absolute, and accept much of the historical aspects of it as being literal.

Just like to chime in here. What the Pope said is correct. You DO NOT have to be a Christian to get into Heaven. You can be a nonbeliever, but if you lead a "virtuous" and good life, then you're pretty much golden to getting through the gates. I went to catholic school for 10 years. I've learned enough about the Bible and scriptures to know that if you're a good person, you're gonna go to Heaven. Believer or not. By Baptizing his children, he did a good act in introducing his children to God. The God that I know, would be very proud of that, as the Pope said. If there is indeed a Heaven, the father is 100% up there.

And I'm like 666% sure that he's a Satanic.

No, they don't. I am a Catholic who went through the Sacrament of Confirmation and I can assure you this is inaccurate. Any within the Catholic church who prioritize following the book literally vs. interpreting its positive messages are looked down on.

Not at all. Some might, but by and large no. Hell, I've known priests who've been very vocal about this, going so far to say that "the bible is not a science textbook," and is not meant to be taken literally.

can i have a turn telling the actual pope what catholicism is?

I mean, you're just wrong. Fundamentalists take a larger percentage as literal, but they clearly don't take the whole thing literally. Revelation would be an example of something everyone takes figuratively in some sense.

No they don't, Most Catholic belief is directed by the Vatican (aka Pope and friends) and while not up to personal interpretation like Protestantism is, is for the most part not a literal interpretation and is adjusted based on evidence presented. For example, I believe the 7 days of creation is seen as a metaphor for evolution and Adam and Eve as the first human tribes. I understand why you might get mixed up though, there's lots of different groups that interpret the bible differently. Source: I studied this stuff in high school, went to a catholic school and it was mandatory.

he's not an atheist, he is what a modern leader of a religion should be.

I don't know if something was lost in translation to the subtitles, but he never actually says that his Dad is in heaven. He asks a bunch of questions for the audience to answer and then says God would be proud of his Dad, but never answers the question himself. I don't know if that is just a coincidence in how he decided to respond of if he is actively skirting the answer so he doesn't have to say it himself.

He asks questions and makes statements to help the audience and the child come to the conclusion themselves that he went to Heaven. He doesn't need to say it more directly than he did, the way he went about it is far more powerful.

I don't really think he is, though every time this is brought up I think about how hilarious it would be to dedicate your life to becoming Pope as a secret atheist and then revealing that well in to Popehood. Just kinda dunk on the whole religion

I have no doubt that he believes that God would accept the kids Dad in heaven, I just found it interesting that he went about answering the question in a way which didn't require him to directly answer it. In all likelihood, you're probably right and it was just to make the message more impactful, I just wondered if he might use that sort of tactic to avoid criticism from more fundamental elements in the church or something like that.

IIRC protestants are all about "god decides if you go to heaven, not you", catholics are more among the line of "everyone is forgiven, god's merciful, no one's truly doomed".

this is a really underrated post in bad post history

I'm like 99% sure the current pope is a great guy.

I remember, when I was a child, my mother and I had a meet-up with some church deacons. The topic of other religions and atheism had been brought up, and one of the deacons mentioned her brother being atheist. Another deacon then asked her straight up if her brother was to die today, where did she believe his spirit would go. He then proceeded to essentially pressure her into saying her brother would go to hell. I'm atheist myself now, but I respect the solace and hope people can find in religion, and I think that's what the Pope gave to the little boy here. It's far kinder and more strengthening than whatever the hell was going on at my church back then.

OFC you don't approve...

That's how people deal with death.

Pretending that you live in a world where death doesn't matter isn't "dealing with" death, it's just escapism. That isn't to say there's something wrong with that, but pretending you've dealt with something because you've decided to believe you live in a world where it isn't an issue just isn't the same as actually coming to terms with it.

I don't think the tables ever really turned, Catholic Jesuits have historically been on the forefront of scientific and cultural progress in so many places in the world.

While I don't believe in God myself, I can respect what it can do for people, the answer he gave is as good as an answer good have been really, the mindset of a Catholic is, just because someone doesn't believe in God, doesn't mean God has forgotten about them. I still have my own viewpoint on Religion but, it's not like, GOD WHAT A FUCKING LOAD OF SHIT RUURUGHEHUGUEHG, if it helps people, then there we go, it's just the dick heads that go too far with it that are annoying cunts and need to fuck off.

Believing in an afterlife is how many people cope aka deal with death. Of course if there is no afterlife then by your standards there is no such thing as actually dealing with death because whether or not you accepted your fate makes no difference. You'll die and once everyone else is also dead it will be none of us even existed in the first place.

Learning to deal with death is very hard and should not be expected from a kid that age. I wouldn't have the heart to tell that kid that his father is dead forever and that he's never going to see him ever again, even though that is the truth and what I believe as an atheist.

It sure fucks with you. I lost my uncle when I was 8 in a pretty fucked up situatuion and it affected me forever after.