1. Comment #43190 by TrashcanMan79 on May 20, 2007 at 5:48 pm

Once again The Onion succeeds in NOT making me laugh.

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2. Comment #43193 by Dr Benway on May 20, 2007 at 6:04 pm

Onions usually make me cry. But the word "Comedy" under the title of this article made me laugh.

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3. Comment #43196 by mandrellian on May 20, 2007 at 6:20 pm

For once The Onion broke tradition and didn't include the punchline in the headline! I wish they had, because I actually read the whole thing and now I wish I hadn't. There's a reason they aren't in my bookmarks anymore.

To The Onion: for a multi-layered vegetable-themed "satire" webzine your work is consistently transparent and without much in the way of substance. Must try harder. C-

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4. Comment #43199 by MorituriMax on May 20, 2007 at 7:19 pm

I thought it was cute.

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5. Comment #43203 by Carter Maxwell on May 20, 2007 at 8:02 pm

Comment #43199 by MorituriMax
"I thought it was cute."

My thoughts as well. Thank you for being the voice of people who aren't ornery cusses.

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6. Comment #43204 by BT Murtagh on May 20, 2007 at 8:04 pm

The Onion has quite often given me a belly laugh. This one didn't, but it gave me a smile. I thought the Swiffer line was funny, particularly.

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7. Comment #43208 by MelM on May 20, 2007 at 8:34 pm

Not so fast. It seems that they don't know but have hope. Quote from: The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized

3.6. Hope [concluding section]
102. Within the hope that the church bears for the whole of humanity and wants to proclaim afresh to the world of today, is there a hope for the salvation of infants who die without baptism? We have carefully reconsidered this complex question with gratitude and respect for the responses that have been given through the history of the church, but also with an awareness that it falls to us to give a coherent response for today. Reflecting within the one tradition of faith that unites the church through the ages and relying utterly on the guidance of the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus promised would lead his followers "into all the truth" (Jn 16:13), we have sought to read the signs of the times and to interpret them in the light of the Gospel.

Our conclusion is that the many factors that we have considered above give serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptized infants who die will be saved and enjoy the beatific vision. We emphasize that these are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge. There is much that simply has not been revealed to us (cf. Jn 16:12). We live by faith and hope in the God of mercy and love who has been revealed to us in Christ, and the Spirit moves us to pray in constant thankfulness and joy (cf. 1 Thes 5:18).

103. What has been revealed to us is that the ordinary way of salvation is by the sacrament of baptism. None of the above considerations should be taken as qualifying the necessity of baptism or justifying delay in administering the sacrament.135 Rather, as we want to reaffirm in conclusion, they provide strong grounds for hope that God will save infants when we have not been able to do for them what we would have wished to do, namely, to baptize them into the faith and life of the church.

Faith is a vice!

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8. Comment #43211 by MelM on May 20, 2007 at 8:55 pm

I have to admit that it wasn't until the Swiffer line that I cought on--or was it the Freemason line; I've forgotten.

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9. Comment #43216 by mandrellian on May 20, 2007 at 9:34 pm

Yeah, I'm ornery. Onion have let me down too many times and I'm bitter :)

Anyway:

"What has been revealed to us is that the ordinary way of salvation is by the sacrament of baptism."

Salvation from who? My designer? What did I do to deserve to be born destined for Hell anyway?


"Our conclusion is that the many factors that we have considered ... give serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptized infants who die will be saved and enjoy the beatific vision."

Wow, that almost sounds like something an educated, logical person would say. Except for the bit about liturgical and theological grounds, as if they carry any more weight than "we reckon" ...

The church's new improved Hell doctrine really just seems to say "we used to think you'd go to hell if you died unbaptised. Now we think you _probably_ won't as long as you died before we had a chance to get to you because god _probably_ isn't mean enough to send a baby to hell."

Thanks old chap, very charitable.

Do these people read what they write before they publish it? When are catholics going to catch on that these people are just making shit up as they go along and have been for 1500 years?

Bah, humbug. Now I'm all ornery again. Dangit :)

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10. Comment #43221 by D'Arcy on May 20, 2007 at 11:39 pm

I hope, that in this new "progressive" church, the cardinals had a good party with the nuns whilst the pope was in Brazil. Fancy dress mandatory on pain of ?Limbo.

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11. Comment #43222 by Shuggy on May 21, 2007 at 12:07 am

I thought the Onion piece was quite funny (I don't get the Swiffer® reference), but I thought the Vatican's official statement was hilarious!

the responses that have been given through the history of the church

Ribtickling!

There is much that simply has not been revealed to us

Thigh-slapping!

they provide strong grounds for hope that God will save infants when we have not been able to do for them what we would have wished to do

Sidesplitting!

Why didn't it have Comedy at the top?

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12. Comment #43225 by foxfire on May 21, 2007 at 12:26 am

When are catholics going to catch on that these people are just making shit up as they go along and have been for 1500 years?

Give it another 1500 years which, in geologic time, is pretty quick. Of course, the innumerable offshoots that evolve and survive during that period will moot the question. Given that the species survives that long, of course.

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13. Comment #43231 by devolved on May 21, 2007 at 1:41 am

At his death Jesus was crucified with two criminals. One cursed him the other asked "…"Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And he said to him, "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise." [Luke 23:42-44 English Standard Version]

Mankind has a very long tradition of distorting God's teaching and inventing monstrous theories, destructive rules and evil empires. The Bible charts many of them. The link below is but one more recent example:
http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/5043

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14. Comment #43232 by Robert Maynard on May 21, 2007 at 1:49 am

Shut up, stupid.
Seriously, you're just spamming now.

We have already discussed the fraudulence of associating the philosophy of social darwinism with actual darwinism, with particular reference to the book that article cites, From Darwin To Hitler. The whole article rests on this simply bad argument.
Stop cowardly spamming CMI garbage and give us something to talk about.

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15. Comment #43266 by dancingthemantaray on May 21, 2007 at 3:16 am

Not very good, that intelligent falling piece they had was hilarious though

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16. Comment #43268 by Tim Marsh on May 21, 2007 at 3:18 am

devolved said

At his death Jesus was crucified with two criminals. One cursed him the other asked "…"Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And he said to him, "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise."

And the criminal asked Jesus
"Is such a thing possible?"
To which the lord replied
"its easy when youre jesus lol"

Seriously devolved, who are you even talking to? I'm sure you know some people in your life who enjoy hearing simple assertions that are not, and in essence cannot be, substantiated. If you just want to hear yourself type, do us a favour and don't hit 'Submit' when you're done.

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17. Comment #43278 by BillySands on May 21, 2007 at 3:42 am

Oh, is devolved here too? He has just done a runner from yet another thread.
Has devolved ever noticed that the gospels actually contradict each other on what the criminals said.
We have another problem with that verse.Jesus was supposed to decend into the bowels of the earth for three days, so how could he be in heaven?

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18. Comment #43298 by jonecc on May 21, 2007 at 4:36 am

I figured the Pope wouldn't let God let me in, but I am surprised by their vehemence on the subject of babies. If all the non-Catholic babies there have ever been are in there, Limbo must be like the community cafe just after the creche closes for the day. A few millennia of that and you'd be clamouring to be let into hell.

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19. Comment #43309 by Thanny on May 21, 2007 at 5:05 am

One might think that it's highly improbable that there are both people in this world with absolutely no sense of humor (none at all), and people who think The Onion isn't funny.

But you needn't multiply the probabilities, for they are one and the same.

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20. Comment #43316 by flyingscot on May 21, 2007 at 5:26 am

Swiffer® is a disposable duster/mop, Shuggy that is constantly being advertised on the television.

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21. Comment #43318 by jonecc on May 21, 2007 at 5:45 am

These people can be quite funny.

http://newsbiscuit.com/

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22. Comment #43324 by Logicel on May 21, 2007 at 5:51 am

jonecc, newsbiscuit is now duly bookmarked in my humor/irony file.

The Onion gets a bit predictable after a while, though they usually have a good tidbit buried in one of their longer articles.

So far, I prefer newsbiscuit--the wit is like a vise that just manages to squeeze a tortured laugh out, similar to the pleasure when one finally gives in to a violent sneeze.

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23. Comment #43373 by DarwinsPitbull on May 21, 2007 at 7:47 am

On a funny scale of 1-10, I give this a 3.87

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24. Comment #43379 by Greg23 on May 21, 2007 at 8:06 am

For some reason The Onion never did it for me either. Intelligent Falling was very good and the funniest thing I ever heard them do was the original moon landing tapes. ('Jesus H. Christ we are on the f*cking moon').

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wio0ELeTfe4

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25. Comment #43422 by slpeterson on May 21, 2007 at 10:49 am

The Onion specializes in the kind of low-key, dry, sardonic humor that doesn't club you over the head and I think it takes a lot of flak for it. It uses a mock-journalistic format and irony to make points rather than drive its point into your head like a sledgehammer. For many people I think it's too subtle.

This isn't the funniest Onion piece on religion I have ever seen, the best has to be in their book Our Dumb Century, for Jan 1, 2000, "Christian Right Ascends to Heaven" with a picture of Jesus at the top of a heavenly stair and Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, etc ascending. (Clearly, Jerry Falwell has gotten a head start.) I can't quote it exactly since I don't have the book anymore, but there is a Robertson quote along the lines of, "We are excited to share eternally our love and fellowship with our lord in Heaven. There will also be a shared hatred of gays."

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26. Comment #43441 by perkyjay on May 21, 2007 at 12:51 pm

When Vatican II wound up in 1965 I was still a relatively young atheist. The joke I remember coming out of that Ecumenical Congress, as it was officially known, related to the pronouncement that The Vatican had no objection to priests fraternizing with nuns,"provided that they didn't get into the habit".

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27. Comment #43447 by Richard H on May 21, 2007 at 1:31 pm

I think you all will find this Onion piece even funnier:

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/39512

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28. Comment #43448 by Richard H on May 21, 2007 at 1:31 pm

And, does anyone know how we send Josh links to things he may post on the main page?

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29. Comment #43449 by Ivan The Not So Bad on May 21, 2007 at 1:34 pm

Joking aside, the real reason behind the decision to revise limbo is actually quite sick.

In Africa, where child mortality is running at epidemic rates, the RC church was loosing market share to other religions who were able to tell credulous and pitifully distressed parents that if they joined their church/mosque then their poor dead infants would go straight to heaven.

Faced with a haemorrage of its customer base in an important growth area for religious goods and the consequent threat to its business plan, the RC church conveniently found a way to change their policy so as to put their salesforce in a position to offer a product that was equivalent to that of their competitors.

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30. Comment #43452 by Fedler on May 21, 2007 at 1:45 pm

Richard H-

Send articles for consideration to Josh's attention at design@richarddawkins.net

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31. Comment #44289 by Flagellant on May 24, 2007 at 5:46 am

'Fate Of Soul Uncertain After Mid-Baptismal Drowning' [The Onion 23 May 2007]

Isn't it great to see The Onion continuing with its ridicule? Listen here: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/61872

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32. Comment #46188 by BigJohn on May 30, 2007 at 1:50 pm

Very funny. I shall treat my Swiffer with great deference from now on.

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