Does anyone know a lot about the History of the Catholic Church?

[Spalding]

One starting point for your research might be checking out some general histories of the religious orders with ties to evangelization in the "new lands," - like the Franciscans, the Dominicans, and maybe the Jesuits? My copy of "A Concise History of the Catholic Church" mentions "A History of the Franciscan Order from its Origins to the Year 1517" (by John Richard Moorman) as a good general history of that order.

And do you have "Jon Stamos Has a Black Eye" t-shirts available on Cafe Press yet?

[John Junk 2.0]

Ha!  I'll get to work on that. 

I think Jews and Catholics are in a dead heat w/r/t wedding fun.  I can attest to actually having fun at my grandpa's Irish Catholic wake.  And no, his name is not Finnegan.

I'm going to the book store today, so I'm gonna make a list of some of these books you guys mentioned.  Bad Popes is at the top.

I agree, it's much more fun to learn about this stuff now that I'm removed from the structure of the church proper and am not expected to actually believe that these people are touched by the hand of god and whatnot.

[AllisonLeGnome]

As far as I can tell from various friends, Catholicism seems like less fun Judaism. Though that observation probably won't help your research much.

Mardis Gras and a hundred other celebrations are originally catholic... sounds fun to me.  Plus stuff like the "Bad Popes" is great.  A Cadaver Synod is called for now and again, frankly.  My personal experience is that catholic wedding receptions tend to feature a lot more drunkenness and silly dancing than protestant ones-- I'd be curious as to how a jewish one rates on the debauchery scale.  And we all know what the Red Hot Chili Peppers taught us about Catholic school girls.

and for certain values of "fun"--

I generally think that a lot of smart westerners tend to underrate the interestingness and depth of catholic/christian religious thought: from the psychedelic meister eckhart to the insanely systematic aquinas, from the asceticism of thomas à kempis to the seriously interesting life of st. francis: heck, from ignatius of loyola and josemaría escrivá to cardinal newmand and gk chesterton, there are many interesting writers, thinkers and lives bound up in the church.  I think that because it's so close to us, we sometimes have a harder time seeing it, whileas the tripitaka or something seems removed from politics and history.

(And in case you don't remember from older threads-- and why would you?-- I'm a pretty determined atheist.  I just find this stuff interesting.  Not to mention the sheer dungeons and dragons-like pleasure to be had from actually parsing out the specifics of catholic theology like limbo and transubstantiation.)

Speaking more of the day-to-day observation of it, most Jewish occasions are intended to be joyous. Even Shabbat is a day of celebration. I'm kind of the classic archetype of a Jewish-raised atheist and I've never had a "world religions" class that went beyond the most superficial aspects of anything, so I fully acknowledge that I don't know much about the history or theology of either branch of Chistianity. As far as I can tell (and I'm no expert in Jewish theology either- the fact that I can fluently read Hebrew phonetically but can't actually understand a word of it is telling) Judaism tends to celebrate survival, whether in the sense of defeating a literal enemy or giving thanks for the harvest, while Christianity celebrates things I don't understand.

[<<<<<]

Christianity celebrates things I don't understand.

Read some Nietzsche.  (Or don't.)  He tackles this very topic.

[Steeley Chris]

History of the Catholic Church = The Romans made Christianity lame.

Same goes for Paul of Tarsus. Way to the fun outta everything, you turd.
St. Augustine also sounds like he became FWD in his later years.

I do think St. Patrick's and the Apostles of Ireland's brand of Catholicism was probably pretty cool, though.

[Oogie]

History of the Catholic Church = The Romans made Christianity lame.

Same goes for Paul of Tarsus. Way to the fun outta everything, you turd.
St. Augustine also sounds like he became FWD in his later years.

I do think St. Patrick's and the Apostles of Ireland's brand of Catholicism was probably pretty cool, though.

Um, while I respect your right to have an opinion and express it on a public forum, are you being an offensive ignorant bigot on purpose, or are you just playing the caricature of one for fun?

A little tolerance and respect of divergent beliefs goes a long way toward fostering world peace and understanding.

Whereas spouting off the unsubstantiated (and historically suspect) ephemera of bigotry breeds contempt.

(FART!)

[Steeley Chris]

History of the Catholic Church = The Romans made Christianity lame.

Same goes for Paul of Tarsus. Way to the fun outta everything, you turd.
St. Augustine also sounds like he became FWD in his later years.

I do think St. Patrick's and the Apostles of Ireland's brand of Catholicism was probably pretty cool, though.

Um, while I respect your right to have an opinion and express it on a public forum, are you being an offensive ignorant bigot on purpose, or are you just playing the caricature of one for fun?

A little tolerance and respect of divergent beliefs goes a long way toward fostering world peace and understanding.

Whereas spouting off the unsubstantiated (and historically suspect) ephemera of bigotry breeds contempt.

(FART!)

Here is my formal apology to every Roman that lived from AD 313 to 476. Some of my best friends are Romans from 313 to 476. I am also truly sorry that I inadvertently threw St. Paul and St. Augustine under the bus, making me look like a bigot - calling  St. Paul a turd and St. Augustine a FWD was a little extreme, I know that now and I'm sorry. I hope that they can accept my apology and practice some of that forgiveness that your friend and mine, the Christ Jesus, was always talking about. I still, however, think that St. Patrick and co. are pretty bitchin'.

[mylo]

just this...

[youtube]X5McSEU48Y8[/youtube]

[chrisfoll577]

Wow... mylo's really bringing the goods.

[Tim K in DC]

This book is pretty readable and entertaining.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bad_Popes

That's an awesome book title. 

It's also an awesome potential band name.