There is the official belief, of course. But many Catholics don’t buy into much of it.
I agree, most of my acquaintances who frequent churches on Sunday have a very abstract approach to the official beliefs of their denomination. Most of them don’t think very hard (or at all) about what it all actually means. And I must say that I understand why they go to church in the first place.
As long as they are reasonably good people, I’m not going to denigrate their religious choices.
I liked your Dillon story. It vividly depicts what I hinted at in the paragraph above — a drowning man will clutch at a straw. I think that that’s the main reason why people invest their time into religion. In the face of our mortality there are not many choices. We either escape those thoughts (work, drugs, sex, etc.) or we try to face it head on and find a solution. And religions, after all, should fulfill that purpose (alleviation of existential anxiety). But sadly, because priests themselves have no clue, neither do the churchgoers — they simply trust the priests, and that’s that. It’s funny how all those churchgoers consider themselves saved (or at least walking toward salvation) and treat me with pity as a poor lost soul sentenced to damnation (some even explicitly, but all of them at least in between the lines). It used to rub me in a wrong way, but nowadays, I don’t blame them. As I’ve said above, I can understand.
However. It pains me to see blind leading blind. And I would also say that all those reasonably good people would be still reasonably good with or without religion. As I see it, the whole problem with Christian priesthood was already present when mother of James and John asked Jesus for their “primacy”, to which Jesus answered something along the lines that hierarchy is the way of kings oppressing the people and Christians should walk a different path. It’s still in the Bible, but priests, while actually preaching it, don’t walk their talk. And that actually pisses me off — it’s a misuse of power at the expense of the most vulnerable. I understand that churchgoers are desperate for what all those churches should provide, I just say that it won’t happen. They won’t get it — no salvation, no nothing. Not from the priests who depend on holding tight to their positions, desperately trying to keep the upper hand.
