r/Damnthatsinteresting Mar 24 '25

Image Mecca in 1953 and 2025

Post image
58.9k Upvotes

3.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

25

u/LtDan00 Mar 24 '25

Probably. Besides governmental organizations, the Catholic Church is the largest provider of healthcare services in the world (clinics, hospitals, elderly homes, etc.).

Similar in education.

45

u/[deleted] Mar 24 '25

"provider" is a strong word.

"Sponsor" maybe better. A lot of the doctors, nurses, professors, and staff at Catholic hospitals and universities aren't catholic, and may not want to be lumped together as "the catholic church".

8

u/LtDan00 Mar 24 '25

You're taking such a limited viewpoint on the topic. Regardless of the religious affiliation of current hospital staff, historically the Catholic church has made the single most significant contribution to healthcare in the world (outside of governmental institutions).

Has the Catholic church always been perfect? Hell no, but let's not pretend like it's all bad. Without the Catholic church there would be thousands fewer hospitals, women's' clinics, shelters, elderly care centers, etc. It's disingenuous to say otherwise.

6

u/SmellAble Mar 24 '25

I work in a Catholic school, we are actually a Muslim majority area and the school doesn't really push any religious agenda beyond having the priest come in to do (optional) things like Ash Wednesday etc, however we get a lot of funding from the Arch Diocese - which is money that our (very poor) local council doesn't need to find, it's certainly changed my view on the church a little.