re: #411 Nimed

Hey guys. Great to see to see LGF so active (and with such august commenters) at this time of night/morning.

Portugal legalized gay marriage a few days ago too! The Pope, of course, wasn’t too happy about it. Tough shit.

Ok, so this is an Olbermann clip, but I’m pretty sure everyone around here (not just liberals) will enjoy it:

[Link: www.msnbc.msn.com…]

hard to compare. There are around 20-odd million registered Catholics in germany and a similar number of Lutherans, several million Muslims and memebers of other smaller Christian and non-Christian religions.

But most of the Catholics and Protestants aren#t religious in the American sense: they respect their Church as a cultural and social institution and part of their national heritage.

But the churches have a big influence in political and cultural life here, there is a (voluntary) Church tax and (optional) religious instruction in public schools.

And tomorrow is another Public holiday in the Catholic parts of Germany (but not in the Prtestant-majority states) Corpus Christi.

The joke is that you have to ask a half-dozen Germans before you can find one who has any idea what the holiday is about other than a day off and for most a long weekend (lots of Germans take one of their 5-6 weeks’ worth of vacation days on the Friday as well)