I find the Catholic Church fascinating. I find that the current pope was a Nazi as a teen - specifically, a member of an German Hitler Youth group - fascinating. But what fascinates me most is the connection to Rome.
The Church is the direct living descendant of the Roman Empire. I mean, it's the Roman Catholic Church. When the structures of the Roman state were falling, the ruling classes sought refuge in the Catholic Church. The language of the Senate and People of Rome was the language of the educated classes of Europe for two thousand years. Two thousand years.
You'd have thought the Church had learned a lot in those years. It's an amazing thing, an institution hanging on from about 400 AD to now.
Gotta say, though, there's some pretty crappy stuff done in those 1600 years.
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