Proposed Ad: ‘It’s Time to Quit the Catholic Church’

I’m in. Even though they don’t seem to take paypal.

Wow. First attacking only one religion, and now you’re singling out one denomination. To use a phrase from the 90’s. Classy. NOT!

 One step at the time..

I could make 4 or 5 viral-potential videos with the same message for the same budget, if they’re looking to finance some more commercials instead of going with old media.

I think it is great.  Given the rigid stance of the Catholic Church, which goes so far as to deny employees the right to make their own decision about basic health care, it is completely appropriate to say enough is enough. 

I like the idea, though I would quibble with a few details.

– I would shorten the text and enlarge the font. The contraception rule in the healthcare law takes up two paragraph-sized bullet points. Surely the point can be made in less space.

– The part that says “Your church hysterically claims…” rubs me very much the wrong way. By using “your” you are including the reader in the institution and therefore in the culpability. People will naturally get defensive about that. You can make the very same point by saying “The church hysterically claims…”. This wording tells them “This is not you, you are not them. Look at what they are saying!” which distances them from the organization, instead of including them in the accused.

– I would nix the part that says “Every Sunday you’re being lobbied against the Administration” or at least once again de-personalize to “Every sunday, they use the pulpit to lobby against the Administration”. We’re talking to liberal or nominal Catholics. It’s very likely that those who still go to church on Sunday go to liberal Catholic churches that quietly ignore most of the hysterics from the bishops and try to teach love thy neighbor. Even those who are mandated to read a letter can make it abundantly clear by their tone or the context that they disagree with it, even if they don’t say it out loud. By telling the reader that they are being lobbied every Sunday, you are begging for him or her to say “What the Hell do you know? Father Matthew does no such thing!”. By making it inpersonal, you once again make it about the larger efforts of the Bishops, which the reader will likely already have in low regard.

-The part that says “Apparently you’re like the battered woman who..” Uh yeah, please don’t do that. Again you are accusing and berating the reader, the kind of reader who is likely the go along to get along type and will not take kindly to an abrasive tone. Also plenty of people will find the comparison to domestic violence offensive all by itself. You can make it more caring and warm by imploring “Please don’t keep returning to a church that keeps mistreating and disrespecting you and your choices”.

I love the idea generally, but I think you’ll do a lot more good with the “You’re better than your church, they don’t deserve you” tone than with the “Your presence in this organization makes you stupid and complicit in their evil” tone.

The goal here should be to actually help people to quit the Church, not just to attack the Church with a “so there, nyah!” attitude that makes US feel good. I like the idea of this, but I think it falls very short of the goal.

I love the idea generally, but I think you’ll do a lot more good with the “You’re better than your church, they don’t deserve you” tone than with the “Your presence in this organization makes you stupid and complicit in their evil” tone.

Great point(s) Claudia………you should think about offering your ‘tweaking’ services for all such campaigns 🙂

The greater (emotional) distance you can put between someone and their beliefs, the more open they’ll be to looking at those beliefs critically.   

Attacking?  I didn’t know we were attacking today.  Dammit, I left my pitchfork at home!

Seriously, since when does honest criticism constitute an attack?

This is ‘criticism’ not ‘attacking’. Read the proposed again then read the article linked below and tell me which one is more respectful.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-doyle/the-jesuseating-cult-of-r_b_1296358.html

Ugh. Comment typos. 😛

This is a terrible plan. Overt confrontation over this sort of thing just solidifies peoples convictions, even if you hammer out a giant list of very good reasons why they are wrong. Humans aren’t rational enough for this to be sensible.

Do other people not see ‘Edit’ links on their posts? I know I do and it seems to work for me.

Hm, I disagree. It’s important to confront terrible beliefs head-on. Abolitionists did it, Suffragists did it, and in the long run they won their causes. Marriage Equality activists are going it right now, and they’re ultimately going to win their cause, too. I’m sure many people’s pro-slavery and anti-suffrage convictions were solidified in the short term when confronted because, yes, you’re right. Humans are’t always rational, and that is a human’s knee-jerk response to confrontation. Look at the current backlash against gay rights-that’s how these things play out. But, after the knee-jerk, be it weeks, months or years, people do think  through these things, and they very often change their minds. I’ve read about many atheists in this community who did exactly that. We’re playing the long game here, and this is good long-term strategy. (If only they’d clean up the design of the ad! :P)

I see that we are both coming to the same conclusion due to our similitude backgrounds. I too was raised Catholic and sometimes miss the “incense fogged ritual” (still!!!!) even though I have become wholeheartedly atheistic. The ritual, symbolism and “ancientness” definitely kept me in the church much longer than I think I would have been had I belonged to a mega church.

wow. Great attitude. Yes, too much ext….how dare we attempt to turn the tide of American Idiocy by using multi-sylobic words in text form….for SHAME….

It has nothing to do with any “attitude”. 
I just don’t think reading is a strong point of the target audience of this ad.

And oh yes, I forgot….those “New York Times” readers are a knuckle-dragging demographic, aren’t they….yep, best not to use too man y words for them….

The New York times may not be the right venue either.

I agree strongly with every word but the text doesn’t look quite ready for a campaign.

As others have said, there is some redundancy making the text TL;DR

It does include a clear call to concrete action that is easy to participate in, a call not to attend mass… But the Church still counts everyone who was ever baptized as followers whether they care for, let alone attend, catholic churches or not. I suspect the campaign might have a bigger impact if it called on people to make sure they were actually removed from church membership rolls trough the formal act of defection. From what I understand the process is a little bureaucratic but otherwise painless.

A while back the always incredibly insightful Zinnia (youtube`s queen of atheism) explained the process. Basically you just write what is called a formal letter of defection. In this you say you no longer want to be part of the church. Americans can find the address of the local parish and the parish in which you were baptized at http://parishesonline.com the Irish http://countmeout.ie/international/ has example letters as does the Canadian http://www.apostasie.org/ Zinnias letter is a pretty awesome example as well. There is an interesting personal response which shows archbishops actually read these letters. I imagine they kind of have to, its a day-to-day part of keeping church records. I understand some churches will send over someone to talk to you so its probably smart to mention that this wont be necessary. You know, unless you are into that kind of thing I guess. I am sure that if I think hard enough I can come up with an appropriate establishment for having this conversation.

Its a little more work, but I suspect hundreds of letters explaining the consequences of the churches positions and/or actions and/or lack of action and/or leadership choices and/or priorities and/or history would have a higher impact than even thousands of people not showing up for mass. That would just get blamed on the weather or something. And since the campaign is aimed primarily at people who are already not that enthusiastic about going to a catholic church, why not ask them to do something they were not doing already?

A more minor point. I would move something like the Amish horse carriage analogy to earlier in the text. People who have never heard of the FFRF need to know what it is FOR pretty early in the piece if the are gonna keep reading on and on about all the things FFRF is against. As is the text makes this all about a zero sum game between obviously reasonable womans interests vs reasonable sounding “religious freedom”. IMHO it should be clear from the start this is about defending crystal clear longstanding traditional secular principles that have protected peoples essential freedoms for many many years against a foreign new theocratic idea that serves no purpose whatsoever. That should take care of explaining what it is the FFRF actually does. People reading or discussing an open FFRF letter in the nytimes already know about the recent catholic contraceptive brainfart, the question is what does the FFRF suggest people do about it. Whats the point if all you are saying is “this controversy is controversial”?

Finally the current ad design includes as coupon for contacting the FFRF. I suspect including a “I no longer want to be a catholic because” form letter would be even better and reinforce the message. Making sure there is a a US version of the Irish website countmeout.ie ready before the campain might also help a lot of people. You enter your zipcode, get the right address for your diocese, tick the box or boxes for the reasons you are leaving the church, print, stamp send and done… for the ever skeptical me the FFRF membership coupon kinda sorta smacks of using emotional issues to do fundraising…. which is okay but it muddies up the message a little in my book.

All in all it sounds like an awesome campaign that I hope stirs up plenty of well deserved debate.

(Yes I am aware this is officially the world longest complaint about how a text by someone is TL;DR)

What do you do for  living? What is your degree, if you have one, in? What qualifications do you have to explain complicated demographic issues?

I am guessing not many. You are one of a million Internet experts, who feels because they can type into a “comment” box, they must have some sort of insight into every issue.

I am a journalist. I work in the newspaper industry.  I happen to have a tremendous amount of experience and professional insight here, and “Internet” experts simply trod upon the credibility of those with true experience or expertise.

It is the furthering of Idiot America.

So Mr. Journalist can’t handle a difference of opinion without resorting to belittling remarks and snide comments?

You don’t have to be an expert in anything to know that most people simply don’t read walls of text. That is why news stories use the inverted pyramid structure. Most people stop reading after a few paragraphs.

And the invert is pretty outdated. You must not have caught up on the latest since you took that elective class during your run at a degree.

The amount of text is definitely an  important factor to consider- most readers browse ads, not have a relationship with them… 

 I would love to read some of your professional work.  How about some links?

The problem with the text is not so much that it’s too lengthy.  It’s that it’s too divorced from reality.

Whoever wrote it seems to love good snarky rhetoric over facts.

Probably the biggest factual problem is this:

“Every Sunday from the tax-free pulpit you’re being lobbied against the Administration’s contraceptive policy.”

You know, that just ain’t happening.   What’s worse, the people this is being addressed to know better than anyone that it isn’t happening.

I’ve been a Catholic for 16 years and have been to Catholic Mass from coast to coast and back again.  The fact of the matter is that one would find it very difficult to find any homily at a Catholic Mass that talks about sin, any sin.  Or contraception.  Or abortion.  Or Homosexuality.

Instead, the homilies tend to be the most toned down insipid blather one can imagine.

Granted, recently there was a bishop’s letter to have been read at Mass regarding the current controversy.  But guess what.  It wasn’t read everywhere.

And the idea that the US Bishops are waging a war is lunacy.  As is the idea that they seek to prohibit everyone’s access to contraception.

Of course, in the liberal’s mind (and face, most atheists seem to be far left liberals) if someone refuses to pay for something they are waging a war against it.

The liberal and nominal Catholics who go to Mass KNOW this.  When (IF) they read this screed from FFRF they are going to roll their eyes and recognize blatherskite when they see it.

We often here the imperative, “Stay out of my bedroom!  Stay out of my womb!”

Fine.  You want the Catholic Church to stay out of your bedroom?  Fine.  Just don’t call it war when the Church doesn’t want to pay for your party supplies.

 Um. So when the pope specifically refuses to grant contraception to AIDS-suffering regions…

I think you have a fever.  The pope doesn’t grant or refuse to grant contraceptives.  Not sure what that means anyway.

Show me where the US Bishops, as charged by FFRF, has sought to force anyone, Catholic or not, from access to contraceptives.

It hasn’t happened.

The controversy is that the Church doesn’t want to pay for certain services and products.  The governement says they must.

This really is a separation of church/state issue and I find it very interesting that those who champion that separation the most, atheists, seem to be on the side of obliterating that separation because it works against an organization they don’t care for: the Church.

But when that separation has been obliterated, what will the atheists do when the Christianist whackjobs get in power?

Face it, this controversy is not good for anyone, no matter where you stand on the issues of faith, atheism, contraception, health care, etc.

You guys are a minority, and what you see happening here should scare you.

And the Junior Pharisee demonstrates once again why he can’t be taken seriously.

This is indeed a church/state separation issue – but for a reason exactly opposite of what you’ve stated.

Religious institutions are being told that *because* church and state are separate, they have to play by exactly the same rules as everyone else; and that lack of distinction has your Christian-privilege panties in a bunch.

Oh, and the guy who thinks he talks to invisible flying zombies has absolutely no room to tell others that they’re divorced from reality.

Gasp! What an amazing discovery you’ve made: that governments make rules which all citizens have to follow! Such insight!

This would indeed be unfair if: 1. The U.S. government was some alien Thing imposed upon us, in which we could not participate and which we could not influence; and 2. If those rules were not made to apply to everybody – you know, such as if hospitals got special exemptions from employment law because they stick a cross out front.

And yes. Really.

Think of nature as your God. A God whose purpose and intelligence is far beyond our comprehension. A God without favor or prejudice. A God who just keeps on creating & destroying life and is oblivious to our individual or species survival. A God who through an eternity has and will create life trough constant rebirth and death. Not a God of human creation yet one we all know well. A strange paradox where madness reigns and purpose is fleeting. A universe teeming with life all vying for survival.

Such a universe must be totally void of morals, purpose or reward. But, for the species lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time; a species with the intelligence to unlock the secrets of God himself, this species may be able to survive in the universe through future eternity. If humanity is to survive we first have to save our planet, then explore the universe while spreading the seed of mankind to insure our survival from natures eventual destruction.

This view of God  comforts me greatly when I realize that I could be a part off, or maybe a contributor to the immortality of such a species.

“Fine.  You want the Catholic Church to stay out of your bedroom?  Fine.  Just don’t call it war when the Church doesn’t want to pay for your party supplies.”

No, as usual, you have it inverted and twisted.

You say it is “war” when in FACT, it is nothing more than you asswipes not getting privileged treatment or preferential treatment. That isn’t war Hoss. That is LAW, and it is the legal and moral thing to do.

Also, before you start claiming you are footing the bill for the wanton carnality alleged to be taking place, don’t forget that your pedophile hiding, evil, women subjugating organization has tax free status and enjoys privilege the likes of which even a white man in the USA doesn’t get.

So take your butt-hurt bullshit somewhere other than a realm of rationality and reason.

Don’t waste your time with this guy. Logic left the building the first time a priest’s phalange went up his anus…

FSq, I’m sorry you were raped by a priest.  I can’t imagine how warped and perverted your thinking has become because of it.  Child rape is an evil thing, even if you don’t believe in evil.  It really is a terrible crime, and you not even out of junior high school yet.

But politically far left looney atheists like you are really beyond hope.  Your hatred and bigotry, combined with your socialistic left wing politics, make for an world view that is, well, twisted.

What you call preferential treatement is really the 1st Amendment.  The tax exempt status that fires up the bigoted imagination of your ilk is indeed an example that there are different rules: Churches do not pay taxes.

But still, the whack-a-doodle liberal mind can see no difference between taxed and untaxed income.  There seems to be this idea that all income belongs to the government anyway.  So if someone has money that hasn’t been paid to the government, then the taxpayers are subsidising whatever that individual spends that money on.  It’s a “logic” that no one really has the right to own anything.  It’s marxism really if taken to its logical conclusion.

Regarding pedophile priests, most weren’t pedophiles.  Most of the victims were well into puberty.  These were cases of gay priests “awakening” the “gay” in boys.  Gross I know, but in some quarters the “awakening” concept is held in esteem.  Go figure.

In any event, hardly a week goes by that I don’t hear at least one news story of a teacher being arrested for having sex with a student.  These are good old fashioned public school teachers.  Why don’t I hear an outcry against the evil pedophile teachers in the world?

It would be interesting to do a statistical study to find out how the teachers stack up against the priests.

I also find it funny that yesterday I think it was you were giving someone a bunch of your usual FSq bile.  You were telling them that they didn’t know jack just because they can google.  Then today you post a bunch of links you had googled in what I can only presume was to be some overwhelming show of, I don’t know, google superiority.  You are funny sometimes.

But mostly you are a pathetic hatefilled bigot.  And the bile in your heart is going to harm you more than any harm you may ever wish upon those you hate.

The Catholic church pays for everything with what they take from parishioners. Their money is tied up in church opulence and greed. They should treat people with common respect. Imagine how many starving could be fed with their blood money.
This is war, on religion.

Do you have any idea how sick you are?

 Ask them to take their bullshit into a realm of rationality and reason!

 I don’t care for the whole “something so small” lines, either.

That there are people for which overt confrontation doesn’t work doesn’t mean there aren’t people for which overt confrontation does work. Make sense now?

 I like “including the reader in the institution and therefore in the culpability.” They are culpable as long as they keep associating with the church. That’s kind of the whole idea.

All religions are an abomination on the human psyche. They limit your clear view of reality by filling playable minds with whimsical nonsense to maintain the master/slave relationship between the church and sheep. If church leaders had any moral fibre they would be able to recognize the Santa aspect of the madness they hold true beyond death. Reality awaits you.

People are free to believe in whatever nonsense they want and until today can even order the faithful to defy democracy. When it comes to the public health and safety, especially of the young men and women in our society, it’s time we drew the line in the sand. Luckily most youth of today’s youth have enough common sense to reject stupidity.

You were raped by some religious leader and had your free will screwed entirely from your brain. Learn to think with reason, not emotion.

I am proud to say I contributed to the fund to run this ad. The money was raised in record time;  maybe that says something about how fed up rational Americans are with the Catholic church and religion in general keep[ trying to meddle in our private affairs.

also please read http://www.evilbible.com and stop funding the church and church related activities especially those diverted to Asian countries like India and Srilanka to convert people these are totally misused and may gradually lead to even formation of terrorist groups by the churches 

I recieved this email from Jihad Watch

Dhimmitude at the WaPo: Anti-Catholic ad OK, truth about Islam nixed
Jun 20, 2012 12:07 pm | Robert
Pamela Geller has the story: Dhimmitude in the West. On May 8, The Washington Post ran a hate-filled attack on the Catholic Church, the same ad that ran in the NY Times. But unlike the New York Times, the Washington Post ran the anti-Catholic ad with no changes; the Times…

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/06/dhimmitude-at-the-wapo-anti-catholic-ad-ok-truth-about-islam-nixed.html