Count Me Out.ie

[GazUtd]

Can the Vatican, in any way, legitimately hinder your rights in Ireland? No.

Hmmm. Depends on how you mean legitimately.

Do women in Ireland have a right to an abortion? No. Is this because the Vatican influence both the government and the people of the country? Maybe.

[Reilly616]

Can the Vatican, in any way, legitimately hinder your rights in Ireland? No.

Hmmm. Depends on how you mean legitimately.

Do women in Ireland have a right to an abortion? No. Is this because the Vatican influence both the government and the people of the country? Maybe.

Well, women in Ireland don't have the right to an abortion in Ireland, subject to exceptions, because 18 years ago, 65% of the population thought they shouldn't have. Anyway, if you consider that to be because of Vatican influence (which I think is a stretch), then it still didn't hinder any existing rights. At most it slowed down the creation of a new right, which is what the conservative population worldwide tend to do anyway. Sure, it's probably due to their religious views, but what I meant is that that little so-called "state" cannot, by its laws, lessen our rights here. Whether or not it can influence the populace or judges morally is another question. To which the answer, clearly, is yes it can.
Would you believe, in the case which created the right to use contraception in Ireland, the judge was following a precedent which in part refered to the "Christian nature of the State". It's a weird world!

[aZerogodist]

Here's the video:

Catholic Church closes door on Apostasy/Defection CountMeOut.ie to focus on Census 2010 -Paul Dundar

Just a few notes from the meeting with co-founder of Count Me Out, Paul Dunbar, 02 November 2010 I will double post this in the other threads (mortal sin I know)

Why we suspended the site:
The references to defection in cannon law was announced in 2009 that they would be removed by the pope, the references to defection has now been removed Because of the number of emails from people trying to defect, saying they were unable to, countmeout got in touch with the Arch-Bishop in Dublin to clarify the situation and kept getting responses back saying that they acknowledge that there were changes coming but could elaborate on what they were. The impression was that they didn't know themselves, it was the Vatican pulling the strings.
Paul said that he thinks the changes has nothing to do with the amount of people leaving the church or the countmeout website, but was something that had been in training for quite a while, it has been suggested that it was to close this loop hole, but Paul said that countmeout do not think that, but a side effect of another change they made to cannon law.

Church response:
In response to a request by RTE for a balance interview the church just issued a statement:
"The holy sec confirmed that at the end of August that it was introducing changes to Cannon Law, and as a result no longer be possible to formally defect from the Catholic Church. This will not alter the fact that many people can defect from the church and continue to do so all be it not through a formal process"

Paul said that this causes more confusion, as how can you defect but not formally, how does that work. As of yet countmeout has got no further clarification.

Possible Challenges
He said that there were a number of ways of challenging it would be:
1. The Data Protection Commissioner, as part of the data protection act, any organisation that holds information on you is obliged to hold accurate information and also obliged to divulge that information to you fully, if it's not accurate you're in your rights to challenge that and say that's not accurate, so if you asked for a record from your local parish, and it said Baptised, confirmed, holy communion, married etc but no record of defection and they still consider you a member, you could theoretically challenge them on that, saying that's not an accurate reflection of your position in the church, you don't consider yourself a member any more and they haven't recorded that fact.

2. Common Law, freedom of association, freedom of religion, if the church will not allow you to leave it seems they would be in contravention of the consitution. But how to go ablout that is yet to be tested.

Whats the future of Countmeout
Paul went on to talk about the future of countmeout, and how many people criticized them, saying it doesn't matter what the church count as their number, the state only looks at the census figures and the religious numbers their in, so what matters is what's in the census.
So Paul said if the number of Catholics decreases in a significant way in the next census, it would send the message that the number of schools under catholic patronage is over represented, also in the health service. There would be more weight behind the aurgument that you remove some of this power from the church to be involved in health and education.

He said that the possibilities are there but not sure on how they will go about it, if they do a countmeout-census it will be ready to go but just a matter of doing it right. Catholicism for Irish people is like their blood type, or their ethnic group and it's kind of like they think "oh yeah I'm catholic, I still had sex with my partner last night, I'm not married but I'm still catholic or I used contraception, I'm still catholic" it's almost subconscious when they get the census it's like blood type B, religion catholic.

Paul went oin to say even if you’re still officially a member you can still count yourself out as being recognised as a member in the census. Countmeout what to reach those people who might automatically put down catholic, because they think once a catholic always a catholic and try to get them to reflect on that and put down the truth.

(Side-note: Paul also noted that there is the only one Atheist in countmeout himself and that the site was set up for those people who no longer wanted to be counted as followers/members of the catholic church)

[MyloD]

Everyone who's worying, keep this in perspective.

Has the law on data storage changed in Ireland? No.
Do the administration procedures of a tiny absolute monarchy hundereds of miles away have any bearing on Ireland's data protection legislation? No.
Can the Vatican, in any way, legitimately hinder your rights in Ireland? No.

The Data Protection Acts are still the way to go. If the church decides to no longer follow these laws, then you write to the Data Protection Commissioner and he will determine the case. If, for any reason, you are unhappy with his ruling, then you go to the Circuit Court. Nothing of any legal value has changed.

+1 I've always argued that a catholic baptism is no more significant than the mythical 'tinker's curse'. It carries about equivalent weight in the minds of the superstitious god-bothering segment of the population. As I've also said in previous posts, even if you could argue that the church misrepresents it's following by counting baptisms rather than active members, they would only have to make minor changes to the wording to comply with the data protection act. For example instead of saying "The Catholic church counts X Billion members", they could equally say the "The Catholic church counts X Billion baptized individuals".

It's always going to be a difficult, nebulous and/or semantic argument when you attempt to remove yourself from an organisation while simultaneously refusing to accept its validity...

Having said all that, I would like a piece of paper to say I'm no longer a member. But I'm not getting to worked up about it. I think we have bigger fish to fry.

[Ciaran]

It's always going to be a difficult, nebulous and/or semantic argument when you attempt to remove yourself from an organisation while simultaneously refusing to accept its validity...

Having said all that, I would like a piece of paper to say I'm no longer a member. But I'm not getting to worked up about it. I think we have bigger fish to fry.

We do have bigger fish and I give a proportional amount of time tofrying time to each fish but this is a personal issue to a lot of people so I think they'll keep frying. I'm worked up only by the totalitarian nature of the CCL keeping me signed up against my will and I'm aware the impact of my defection is about zero on the institutional church. It does have an impact on me though because I think it's the right thing to do. I agree that following a course of defection may confer an image of relevence on them but unfortunately they are relevent and will be for some time.

There is civil law and they'll have to get used to following it; this is the only tiny way I can personally see to it that they do. For other fishues I join groups like Atheist Ireland and do it collectively.

[Beebub]

We do have bigger fish and I give a proportional amount of time tofrying time to each fish but this is a personal issue to a lot of people so I think they'll keep frying.... There is civil law and they'll have to get used to following it; this is the only tiny way I can personally see to it that they do. For other fishues I join groups like Atheist Ireland and do it collectively.

+1

[Rogmeister]

I'm a bit confused by the matter- I e-mailed the bishop of Meath several weeks ago asking to leave the church, they sent me forms to declare my defection, and to send it back to them and they would amend my baptismal forms and forward me a copy.
I haven't received anything back from them yet, but I'm hopeful.

In any case, Mr Ratzinger should be a bit sympathetic to what it's like to be branded at a young age with the indelible mark of a hateful organization.

[aZerogodist]

Keep us up to date, I think you can still do it if baptised in the UK.

[Rogmeister]

Just got a letter from the diocese of Dublin saying they have amended my baptismal cert to state my defection from the church.

Right lads, if ye want to defect- start sending e-mails the the bishop of your choice!

[Beebub]

Rog, that's great. Can I suggest that you send a copy of it to the Countmeout website? You can delete/ hide personal information from it before sending it. I'm sure they'd like to know. Can I also suggest that you post a copy to the Athiest Ireland Facebook page informing people that you were able to do it. There are plenty who have tried since the change in 'Canon' Law and have been refused.