From the Guardian:
In a move designed to coincide with the pope's visit to Britain in September, London buses are to carry posters calling for the ordination of women.
The initiative, from the UK group Catholic Women's Ordination (CWO), will see buses carrying the slogan "Pope Benedict Ordain Women Now".
According to the weekly Catholic magazine the Tablet, CWO has paid about £10,000 for the posters to appear on 10 buses for a month from August 30.
The pope will be in the UK from September 16, spending two days in the capital, and the posters will appear on routes that go past Westminster Cathedral and Westminster Hall. Both venues feature on the papal itinerary.
....
Buses have become the preferred vehicle for believers and nonbelievers to promote their cause to the wider public. The trend started in January 2009, when a group of atheists arranged for an "upbeat and positive" message to counter slogans of hellfire and damnation from some churches.
The ad campaign by the Catholic Women's Ordination group will counter the Vatican's recent classification of women's ordination as a delicta graviora (more grave crime) against church law.
As expected, the Vatican also updated its list of the "more grave crimes" against church law, called "delicta graviora," including for the first time the "attempted sacred ordination of a woman." In such an act, it said, the cleric and the woman involved are automatically excommunicated, and the cleric can also be dismissed from the priesthood.
I predict that delicta graviora will soon become household words. "Stop tracking mud into the house! That's a delicta graviora!"
Thanks to Ann v. for the link.
UPDATE: Erp in the comments points out that ads appeared in buses as early as 2007 for the Christian Alpha Course.
The commercial will appear on screens in hundreds of bars nationwide and hundreds of buses in London and Birmingham.
The article is slightly inaccurate.
ReplyDeleteThe campaigns started when Alpha used bus ads to look for potential Christian converts at least as early as October 2008. The atheist campaign came a bit later.
So which ad would most distress the current pope? Ones implying god doesn't exist or ones stating women can be and should be priests.
Erp, thanks for the correction. I remember the stories about the Alpha ads. I found a link and posted an update.
ReplyDeleteAs to which ad would be most distressing to the pope, I'd hazard a guess that the answer would be the women's ordination ad.
The women's ordination ad would be the most distressing because if that could could happen, it would prove to him that there's no God.
ReplyDelete...it would prove to him that there's no God.
ReplyDeletePerhaps to the pope....
Yeah, just him. It would prove the opposite to the rest of us!
ReplyDeleteThe campaigns started when Alpha used bus ads to look for potential Christian converts at least as early as October 2008.
ReplyDeleteThe media are so biased over this issue. When the atheist bus campaign ran there was actually a story on the Guardian website headlined "We did it!" I was so annoyed by that. Who's "we???"... You can count me out, for a start. Of course they conveniently forget who first thought of the strategy.
It would prove the opposite to the rest of us!
ReplyDeleteYes, indeed!
Progressive Christians don't get no respect
ReplyDeleteNo, we do not!! Quite wrongly.
Oh, it does make me cross sometimes.
Much as I admire the omnibus campaign, I think something a bit stronger will be needed. Might I suggest the TARDIS?
ReplyDeletewv = Aderlsfe -- a small English village in Nothinghamshire.
oh, the Tardis with an ad on the side saying "Ordain Women Now" would be so unspeakably fabulous.
ReplyDeleteTARDIS is perhaps a bit over the top, but surely an arresting attention-getter in Westminster.
ReplyDeleteWell I might count as one of the 'we' being an atheist. You have to admit that in England with Rowan Williams counted as one of the progressive Christians that Dawkin's complaint that progressive religions enable more reactionary versions has some justification.
ReplyDeletePersonally I don't think ordination of women would prove God's existence. The Unitarians have been doing it for over a century and the Quakers have had female leaders even longer (think Margaret Fell in the 17th century).
Erp, should we all give up our ties to the faith because we do more harm than good by enabling the reactionaries? I know that I am a better person for being a person of faith - not better than anyone else, but better than I would be with no faith.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that ordination of women or anything else, for that matter, would prove God's existence.
The thing is, militants like Dawkins and Sam Harris know as much about theology and religion as I know about science, which is not very much. They set up straw men to knock down. They need to know more of what they speak,
"oh, the Tardis with an ad on the side saying "Ordain Women Now" would be so unspeakably fabulous."
ReplyDeleteBut when is "now" on a TARDIS?
My friend S has a model tardis on his desk that vibrates when his cell phone rings.
ReplyDeleteI just thought of that.
:-)
I'm not saying give up your ties, and, I'm certainly not going to force you. However one should beware enabling the reactionaries (a trap I think that Rowan Williams has fallen into and Jefferts Schori seems to have mostly avoided).
ReplyDeleteAlso I would not call Harris or Dawkins militant, outspoken yes but not militant. Militants don't normally talk peacefully with the opposition.
Erp - obviously I don't have a problem with atheists mounting a bus campaign or Christians then doing the same, but I think the headlines should confine themselves to saying "Atheists mount bus campaign" etc, and even if there is an opinion piece by an atheist involved with the campaign the headline should have been more neutral than "we did it!".
ReplyDeleteI do dislike the way the Guardian tends to assume its readers and staff are all atheists though. I heard with my own ears a section editor ask a writer to take a reference to the "pearly gates" out of a piece because, he said, "Our godless readers won't understand it." He was serious - he didn't mean won't like, he meant won't understand. I find that sort of thing really irritating.
By the way, is your first name Emma? You said you were named after a Jane Austen book. Just curious.
Rick - I'm not sure when "now" is on the Tardis, but disseminating the message about ordaining women round the known universe can surely do no harm. Unless cybermen or Daleks then decide to mount a dastardly campaign aiming at world domination through disguising themselves as Anglican lady priests. But that would be another story.
ReplyDeleteOh I agree the Guardian title seems a bit over the top unless they were quoting someone or it was an opinion piece. In fact checking it was a signed opinion piece by Ariane Sherine who organized the campaign so the title seems appropriate. She is referring to herself and her supporters.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jan/06/religion-atheism
I suspect btw that Richard Dawkins and many other British atheists would also be appalled that the readers wouldn't understand a reference to 'pearly gates' and that is more an indictment of the school system (though given the large number of Christian run state schools in Britain and a government requirement on (Christian) religious education in all schools someone is really not doing their job). If nothing else Dawkins uses Biblical allusions in his works extensively and I'm sure he wants the readers to get them.
Yes I am an 'Emma'
hiya Erp, speaking as someone who has bunged many a headline on opinion pieces for various papers including the Guardian, they would never normally use such a triumphalist statement - it should really (in my opinion) be much more sober and neutral (and I would say the same if it was a Christian opinion piece). Headlines on opinion pieces in the belief section of the Guardian website tend to be descriptive rather than personal: "God in the classroom", "Can you do counterterrorism without theology?", "Saving granny", "Ever-increasing circles of science", "Rowan on the government cuts", to use some recent examples. To me "We did it!" says loud and clear that whoever wrote that headline shares her approach to the matter, whereas you've got to take a step back with an opinion piece and keep it detached. That's my take on it, anyway.
ReplyDeleteMy point about the Tardis is that "it is about time!"
ReplyDeleteAs to "delicta graviora" -- that's what the family used to do when the sauce was particularly tasty.
I know, leaving the stage, and about to go on retreat, obviously much needed!
However one should beware enabling the reactionaries....
ReplyDeleteErp, I don't see myself falling into the category of enabling the reactionaries. Anyone who reads this blog with any regularity knows that I often rant against Rowan and the reactionaries in my own church.
Also I would not call Harris or Dawkins militant, outspoken yes but not militant.
Harris and Dawkins wish for me to give up my foolish fantasies about the God person. Whatever Dawkins and Harris believe or disbelieve doesn't matter to me. That's the difference. I won't try to convert Dawkins and Harris, if they won't try to convert me. Still, we could have a conversation without conversion as the aim on either side.
And both men should be more knowledgeable about religion, if they want to persuade people away from their faith using rational arguments. At the same time, they might allow that certain scientific knowledge is based on something very like faith. This is what is true, until we find that it is not true, as we make new discoveries.
I know, leaving the stage, and about to go on retreat, obviously much needed!
ReplyDeleteTobias, have a blessed and peaceful retreat, luv.
To all: Tobias should know better. He was a famous actor in another life, in case you didn't know.
Grandmere, I don't classify you with Rowan on this issue; however, such people do exist and are evidence for Dawkins' argument. You and yours are counter evidence but a bit rare on the ground. (liberal Quakers and Unitarians are others).
ReplyDeleteIf Harris and Dawkins wishing you and other Christians to change your views in regards to God's existence is militant then the vast majority of Christians (though not you and others like you) are also militant since most endorse the great commission (both use the same tools--ads, books--but not coercion). It somewhat debases the meaning of the word.
In many ways I think liberal religious people and atheistic humanists can, should, and do work together. It is a debated point amongst atheists. See
http://www.daylightatheism.org/2010/07/building-bridges-with-believers.html
delicta graviora
ReplyDeleteIt is what you dribble over meat and mashed potatoes from something sometimes called a 'boat'.
You and yours are counter evidence but a bit rare on the ground.
ReplyDeleteErp, there are more of us than you think. We just don't bray as loudly, but perhaps we're too reticent and should make more noise. I'm trying, in my limited way.
The website you link to is lovely. I absolutely think churches and secular groups should work together for the common goals of justice and equality. There are organizations out there which put the churches to shame. I'm thinking of Amnesty International, for one.
It is what you dribble over meat and mashed potatoes from something sometimes called a 'boat'.
ReplyDeletePluralist, so that's what it is! I should have Googled the Latin.
Lots of organizations that try to help their neighbor and where Christian, Jew, Humanist, Hindu, Buddhist, and Muslim can work together
ReplyDeleteAnd some people start young. A local high school student (of the Ethical Culture persuasion but that is incidental) is trying to help kids in Haiti get an education.
http://oneloveadvocates.org/p/contact-me.html
It is working through Prodev (http://prodevhaiti.org/) which seems to be a well established charity in Haiti.
I don't know whether it will fly, but, it is a sign of hope that young people are trying.