My God Can Beat Up Your...Wait, They're the Same

I'm all for ecumenism. I suppose I'm even all for ecumenism in
the Catholic Church, but I'm all for ecumenism is the sense
that I don't think religions gain much by being actively
hostile to each with regards to, for instance, armed conflict.
I don't think ecumenism is necessarily a good idea if it tends
to change the character of the religious belief itself. Karl
Marx called religion the opiate of the masses. Well, the thing
about opiates is that they make people happy. Arthur C. Clarke
said that he viewed religion as insanity, and while he didn't
mind people being happy, he preferred to be happy and sane. ACC
is my favorite writer, but he apparently has not met very many
actual living, breathing human beings, because while they might
not be insane, tolerance is not one of their predominant
qualities. More people have religion than don't. That might not
make believers sane, but I don't think you can classify
religious belief as a symptom, either. What it does mean is
that these people have a core belief which they think makes
them happy, say, Catholicism.

Now, Catholics particularly, have a sort of "go hang yourself" attitude toward religions with which they don't agree. The Protestant Reformation gets all the press, but there was also the Great Schism which split off from the Orthodox Churches. Benny Hex has told people that Christian unity is his objective, but he doesn't mean compromise. He means that people have to agree with him. It should come as no surprise then, that last week, the Pontiff announced that Catholicism provides the one true path to salvation. People criticized him for this, but all I could think was: "He's the Pope. It's part of the job to think that." Nobody who is not Catholic should even really care what he says on the subject. And frankly, I would have guessed that he thought that even if he did not tell me.

The reviving the Latin mass thing got under my skin a little, but if people want the mass in Latin, so be it. However, the idea that the Pope should keep his mouth shut about Catholicism being the one true faith is silly. Whether he is right or not is a matter of factual reality, and not saying it is not going to change anything anyway.
How are people supposed to proselytize if they cannot say that their religion is the best?

I do find it more comforting that the Pope expresses confidence in Catholicism than an Episcopal priest converting Islam without giving up her church. Huh? These are two mutually incompatible belief systems.