A chance to scrap the Angelus - Nutella, Croissants and Pineapples.

SpaceTime wrote: »

I'm sorry but there are substantial T&Cs there for catholic church membership and I certainly wouldn't get back in!
They're just slow to throw people out because they think they can change you, it's a bit like a bad marriage where one partner keeps thinking they can 'fix' the other even though they don't agree on anything!

Have they ever thrown anyone out, even slowly?
I'd be interested to see what you think the Ts&Cs actually are; there are plenty of rules about what a Catholic should do, and what things can get you sent to hell, or excommunicated, or made anathema, or various other sanctions. I've yet to see anything from the Church itself that says 'if you do this, you are no longer a part of the Church'.
As for whether you'd 'get back in', as far as I understand it, if you've been baptised a Catholic no matter what you've done, repentance and absolution restores you to full communion.
Even those who completed the formal act of defection whilst it was possible, are not considered to have ever not been a part of the Church.

I would just like to offer a sincere apology to anyone i offended during my time on this forum. I used the fcuk word on a few occasions and lost my temper, i insinuated that some Irish people who don't conform to the Catholic faith should leave the country and maybe i was a little reckless in talking about people of other faiths/viewpoints. My intentions were never to harm nor were they sinister in any shape or form. But i do want to apologise because as a human being first and foremost, i think it is important to admit when you are right and when you are wrong.

So to anybody on this forum who felt offended in any way by any of my posts i sincerely am sorry from the bottom of my heart. I am far from a perfect Christian or human being, i don't proclaim to be nor will i ever do so. I make mistakes but i will always admit when i am wrong and apologise. I will always try to help others rather than hurt them no matter what race, creed or makeup. I respect everyone who made a contribution to this forum, i enjoyed the debate and hopefully many more in the future. Once again, i am sorry and regret if i upset anyone during this forum. We all were children once, we all have our own truths and we all have had ups and downs I'm sure in our lives. I think it is important, therefore, in light of this that no matter what our differences we continue to show love and respect one another as human beings. Much love and hope you are all having a great day. I hope you all accept my apology, T86.

Absolam wrote: »

Which speaks to how we might consider an evolving linguistic definition of the word, but doesn't really say anything with regards to it's religious definition. You're right, overall what a Catholic is is probably a minor point in the context, but it has been used to attempt to establish a basis for repudiating the notion that Catholics are a sufficiently significant proportion of the population to warrant relevant cultural programming on RTE, which is why it's being debated.

Yes, but because there is a disjunct between people calling themselves catholics and actually having catholic beliefs, the fraction of the overall catholic population for whom catholicism is important in their lives and are not just culturally catholic is important. I will expand on this in a minute on another point.

Absolam wrote: »

That's where I have to disagree again; neither the Catholic nor the Catholic Church has any need to proselytise their understanding of the term Catholic. They understand it, and it's significance is really only relevant to them, unless they want to convince someone to become Catholic, in which case they have an obligation to explain what they mean by it. Whether or not someone is confused about what a Catholic, or the Catholic Church, means by Catholic makes no difference whatsoever to whether the Catholic is Catholic. A common understanding of what it means to be Catholic does not define their Catholicism, baptism defines their Catholicism.

Well here's the thing. A person can state in a conversation that they are catholic. By that they could simply mean that they were baptised catholic and not be making a comment on what they actually believe. However, since the discussion is about the relevance of a catholic call to prayer to the population at large, it is the person's actual beliefs which are of relevance. Therefore, in the context of this debate, calling a person catholic in the sense that they were baptised says nothing about their relationship with catholicism, their beliefs and thus has no impact on a debate about the relevance of the angelus.

Absolam wrote: »

Clearly ludicrous how exactly? Part of RTEs mandate is to reflect the social and cultural values of Irish society, and whether you think 84% of the population are Catholic, or 30% of the population are Catholic, being Catholic forms part of the social and cultural values of a large portion of our society, so RTEs programming is required to reflect that. I can't say whether that 84% want to hear the Angelus every day (though I can say that Brians assertion of a non religious majority is patently incorrect); but RTE have said their research shows that a clear majority of Irish viewers still favours keeping the "Angelus" broadcasts, so I'm willing to allow that there may be a correlation. If the broadcast reflects the social and cutural values of a portion of society (and it seems to me it does), then it's not a waste of money.

Ludicrous on the basis that because 84% of the Catholic population tick the catholic box on the census, this means that somehow the Angelus is reflective of their actual beliefs. We've already established and you have acknowledged that a person calling themselves catholic need not have the definition that they hold catholic beliefs, that they may mean that they were baptised Catholic. So there is no basis for saying that the 84% Catholic figure is actually representative of the beliefs or values of Irish society.
Now in your post above you comment on how RTE have said that their research finds that the majority of people want to keep the Angelus broadcast. Unfortunately RTE haven't shown the math on this research and their assertion is just that an unsubstantiated assertion and as Carl Sagan said what can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. You see, RTE are not very forthcoming with information at the best of times. If you look at the BAI monitor reports on RTE you will see vast swathes of data (staff wages, number of actors employed etc.) redacted due to commercial sensitivity concerns. Similarly TAM (the company which measures TV viewing figures) don't publish full lists of viewing figures but release trends and top 10s to the media. However, what we can say about the Angelus from TAM information disclosed to the press is that the Angelus has an average viewership of 318,000 people. So therefore we can say that the Angelus is relevant to and reflects the beliefs of 318,000 people. That's it. We can't say that it reflects the beliefs of 84% of the population because a) we know from church and other catholic media sources that the actual mass attendance figures are somewhat in the region of 30% and b) because the values of Irish society as measured through opinion polls don't accord with teachings of the church (i.e. the over 60% majority in favour of gay marriage).

Absolam wrote: »

As to whether it constitutes an endowment under Article 44.2.2 of the constitution, I don't see a case for it. The provision doesn't prohibit the State from paying religious organisations for services rendered, nor does it prohibit the State from allowing religious matters to be broadcast. I very much doubt that if there were any realistic prospect of convincing the SC that allowing religious broadcasts constituted endowment (even allowing that the SC might take a descriptivist position on the term, the Irish text is Ráthaíonn an Stát gan aon chóras creidimh a mhaoiniu; I suspect the SC would lean towards the 'financing' or 'funding' translation of mhaoiniu when considering what endowment should be taken to mean) someone wouldn't have made the attempt by now.

OK, let's see. The Angelus is broadcast twice a day on both RTE TV and RTE Radio. The broadcast is a minute long. The commercial cost of a 30-second advertisement either during or bookending the Six One News is €5500. This means that the Angelus is using €11000 of commercial airtime per day just on the airtime at 6pm on RTE One TV. This is commercial airtime being provided, for free, for the benefit of a single religion. That is an endowment, as in:

" Funds or property donated to an institution, individual, or group as a source of income."

Contrary to your assertion this is not the State paying a religious group for services rendered. The content is entirely produced by RTE and offered for free. If RTE were airing a piece filmed and edited by someone else, you might, and I stress might, have a point. However, the nature of the current arrangement is an endowment whatever way you slice it.

How can you be so sure Fred?

Its not your fault. The part in Good will hunting where Robin Williams embraces Matt damon comes to mind.

tirchonaill86 wrote: »

Its not your fault. The part in Good will hunting where Robin Williams embraces Matt damon comes to mind.

MOD
Banned for movie spoiling. Or, possibly not.Cliffhanger awaits!

Also folks DO NOT make troll accusations in thread.

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

not really, because a substantial proportion of the 318,000 will be saying "****ing angelus :rolleyes: wish they'd hurry up and put the news on FFS"

We can't know how many are watching it because they want to watch it, and how many because it's there and they're waiting for the news to come on.

I agree but I was trying to be as generous as possible to Absolam's side of the argument. Given that 318,000 is about the only concrete evidence in this whole debate I was giving him the benefit of the doubt with regard to the Angelus' relevance.

Absolam wrote: »

That seems to be assuming that cultural programming for Catholics isn't relevant to 'cultural Catholics' though. Whilst non-observant Catholics may not actually engage in the Angelus prayers, that doesn't actually mean they don't still find the programme relevant to them; they could quite easily see the Angelus programme as being part of the culture they identify with.

I'm not assuming anything. What I am saying is that although 84% of people tick the Catholic box in the census, we know that a large proportion of these people are not faithful catholics, i.e. they do not attend mass (only 30%) and nor do they align with church teachings (e.g. gay marriage). Therefore, there is no evidence to suggest that a catholic call to prayer holds any relevance for them. Now if you have evidence to support this assertion of yours then fine, but in the meantime, the sensible position is to reject the claim that the Angelus is relevant or important to 84% of the population because it has not been supported by evidence.

Absolam wrote: »

Firstly, I don't think the discussion is about the relevance of a catholic call to prayer to the population at large.

Really? Because further down your post you say the opposite:

"To be fair, I'm not saying that the Angelus is necessarily representative of their beliefs; I'm saying that it is likely to be relevant to them. Even a cultural catholic, as it is being put, is likely to place some value on Catholic culture, of which the Angelus is a part."

Firstly, relevance is at the centre of this discussion. With regard to religious programming Catholicism utterly dominates the airtime with regular Sunday services, Urbi et Orbi, the Angelus twice a day on multiple channels and all feasts and special events covered. No other religion is accorded this level of cover. There are no Jewish services broadcast or coverage of Diwali or why not broadcast the Muslim call to prayer if relevance is not an issue. If you are catering to minority interests and there are 50,000+ muslims in Ireland, then why should RTE not broadcast the Muslim call to prayer daily. Why do they only get Ramadan diary?

Secondly, twice in your second quote above you use the term likely. You claim that it's likely to be relevant to them and that cultural catholics are likely to place some value on the Angelus. Likely on what basis? Where's your evidence to support this contention.

Absolam wrote: »

So long as a sufficiently substantial proportion of the population feel that the Angelus is of interest to them and/or reflects their culture, it's relevant.

Again, where's your evidence. You're claiming that a substantial proportion of the population feels that the Angelus is relevant to them. Yet this is not born out anywhere except the Census (which we have reason to suspect). It's certainly not relevant as a call to prayer given the very low mass attendances. It's certainly not relevant to the point that many of them actually watch it given the low viewing figures.

Absolam wrote: »

Carl Sagan also said extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence; I'd say to claim that RTE are deliberately making false statements about their viewing figures in order to protect the Angelus would be an extraordinary claim in fairness.

Except that I didn't make any such claim. Trying to shift the burden of proof is not only a weak argument but also a logically fallacious one. What I said, if you read my post, is that RTE have claimed that a majority of people want to keep the Angelus. However, RTE have not published said research and so their claim remains unsubstantiated. Any unsubstantiated claim can be summarily dismissed. This is the principle of the null hypothesis. This is not making a positive claim about RTE, its just rejecting their unfounded claim.
Also, it doesn't have to be case of RTE making deliberately false statements. Let's say 50 people responded to the survey and 35 wanted to keep the Angelus. That would be as you described a clear majority. But it would also be completely unrepresentative of the population at large.

Absolam wrote: »

However, even going on the TAM ratings you provide, it's readily apparent the viewing figures aren't inconsequential; in 2013 Six One News gets 489,100 viewers for instance, topping out at 764,000 for (aptly enough) their reporting on the election of Pope Francis (because it was culturally relevant?). The Late Late Show is the most watched show on RTE, and has average viewing figures of 1,547,000; so viewing figures of about 20% of the highest rated show on tv would certainly indicate that there's an appetite for the show.

Of course it's inconsequential. You can talk about the viewing figures in relative terms all you want. However, 318000 people is still just 318000 people. Now as Hotblack Desiato points out, not all of these people are necessarily going to watch out of religious interest. But let's say for the sake of argument that all of them are. That's still just 6% of the population. So there is no evidence on the basis of viewing figures to suggest that the Angelus is relevant to any more than 6% of the population.

Absolam wrote: »

I don't think the funds (or the property, if you view the airtime as property) is provided to the Church as a source of income though, is it?

It is property (in the same way intellectual property is treated) which would ordinarily cost €11,000 per minute and is being given for free for the promotion of a single religion. That is an endowment.

Absolam wrote: »

The very airing of religious material is not a source of income for any religious organisation (excluding material soliciting donations); if it were it would be unConstitutional to air any religious content whatsoever. The Six One news would not even be able to report on the election of a new Pope.

Nice strawman. As I'm sure you're aware, there is a big difference between airing a programme about religion (i.e. a documentary on the papal election) and airing a programme promoting a religion (i.e. the Angelus). Just as there is a difference between airing a documentary about the corporate structure of a company e.g. Unilever and airing an advertisement for Unilever products. If RTE were to suddenly start giving Unilever free ad time there would be an understandable controversy.

It is not the same since they changed it from Jif.