Shazam!

The Pope is thinking seriously of abolishing limbo. You know, the place in between Heaven and Hell where the souls of dead babies go to be punished lightly, or rewarded a little, or to feel warm and safe, or cold and alone, or maybe nothing at all happens. That place. The Pope thinks he wants to do away with it because "it has always been only a theological hypothesis."

This is an interesting situation since, lacking proof for ANY aspect of faith, someone can still single out one notion as only "hypothesis." Every single word of revealed religions, whether written or verbal, is a theological hypothesis. Without a shred of evidence, one can never say that any part of their faith is a concrete truth. Naturally, that doesn't stop the Pope.

Until the 13th century, there was no limbo. Newborn babies who died went straight to Hell. Neat, huh? Catholics became increasingly uncomfortable with the notion of an omni-everything, compassionate, gentle, loving God sending newborns to Hell, so the idea of limbo was created. Strange; 13th century Catholics were OK with murdering heretics, spreading Christ's word at swordpoint, and carrying out all other bloody manifestations of their heinous cult - why lose sleep over a few babies sent to Hell?

Limbo has long been resisted and protested in the Church. After Catholics made God stop sending babies to Hell, and He started sending them to Limbo, they decided that wasn't so great either. Newborns, because they hadvn't been baptized yet, can't go to Heaven. That's a tried and true rule. This still seemed harsh to a lot of Catholics, and many millions the world over have scrubbed it completely from their daily worship and thoughts.

These same Catholics continue to be more or less cool with discrimination against homosexuals; the criminalization of abortion and excommunication of women who have them and doctors who perform them; the rigid prohibition on any birth control, including the wearing of condoms between married couples, one of whom has AIDS; and generally deferring to the Vatican so as to be kept in a philosophical Stone Age.

I understand, though. Everything I mentioned in the previous paragraph is part of what the Pope refers to as "definitive truth of the faith." "Definitive" because old, white men have gotten together several times since Christ's death to decide what would become doctrine and what wouldn't. "Truth" because they said so, and, after 2000 years people are still more inclined to believe these ridiculous fairy tales than to jettison all religious ideas for the good of mankind.

Goodbye, Limbo. I'll wait with bated breath til the Pope tells me where dead babies go now (I hope it's not my house). In the meantime, I'm gonna go knock up my wife. When I'm done with that, I'm taking her to have an abortion.

Wake up and resist.