CATHOLIC CHURCH IS SO YESTERDAY AND OUT OF TOUCH. - CARDINAL MARTINI.

Icheoku says you just heard it from the proverbial horse's mouth, a cardinal of the catholic church has just said that the catholic church is simply out of touch and out of date and needs to reform urgently. The catholic cardinal and former archbishop of the church in Milan, a former candidate for the papacy, CardinalCarlo Maria Martini, said in his last interview before his death that the Catholic Church was "200 years out of date."

Icheoku says may be this was a contrite heart speaking out or was it simply an after-thought; otherwise why did the 85year old not speak out earlier during his fraternal sojourn in the catholic church and rise through the ranks to a cardinal? May be he was a company-man cardinal who did not want his gravy train to be messed with and thus silently tagged along until it was almost his death time to speak out. Professor Wole Soyinka of Nigeria once wrote, the man dies in him who keep silent in the face of tyranny and this late archbishop and cardinal might as well pass for such a man who Soyinka spoke about since the ancient doctrines of the church could be interpreted as being tyrannical to modernity especially its rigid view on abortion and gay marriage as well as divorce; yet he kept mum all these years?

Cardinal Martini was of the opinion that the church is stuck in the past and centuries gone by as the world has literally moved on without it. In his words, "Our culture has aged, our churches are big and empty and the church bureaucracy rises up, our rituals and our cassocks are pompous. The Church must admit its mistakes and begin a radical change, starting from the pope and the bishops. The pedophilia scandals oblige us to take a journey of transformation. A woman is abandoned by her husband and finds a new companion to look after her and her children. A second love succeeds. If this family is discriminated against, not just the mother will be cut off but also her children. In this way the Church loses the future generation. The church is simply stated, 200 years out of date. Why don't we rouse ourselves? Are we afraid?" Icheoku says, yes the church is afraid of letting go of its past because it is equally afraid of what the articulated reforms might throw up. Needless to add that Republican Party's vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan is one such of a catholic fundamentalist who is stuck up on ancient doctrines and dogmas of the church, which are so antiquated it offends modern sensibilities as simply out of touch and are irreconcilable with today's societal evolutionary needs