>“If you want to lose your religion, make friends with the priest.”
Sounds quite puritanical a view.
Even if we consider Christianity, a priest can and will be (or have been) as flawed as any man, including even a hypocrite, greedy, murderer or worse, and even all kinds of original Christian doctrine (except the BS about the Pope being some kind of super-saint) agrees with that. Heck, the very first person believed to go to heaven in the Christian faith was the murdered/thief/etc next to Christ on the cross.
Clerics in Western religions (Z, J, C, I) (claimed to) sit on a privileged spiritual perch and certainly in Christianity are subject to the "original" 'beam/mote' admonishment.
So yes, if your neighbor is an adulterer, it may be "puritanical" to get on a high horse, but if your confessor is a wolf in sheep's clothing, that is a different story.
Sounds quite puritanical a view.
Even if we consider Christianity, a priest can and will be (or have been) as flawed as any man, including even a hypocrite, greedy, murderer or worse, and even all kinds of original Christian doctrine (except the BS about the Pope being some kind of super-saint) agrees with that. Heck, the very first person believed to go to heaven in the Christian faith was the murdered/thief/etc next to Christ on the cross.