It can easily be proven that much of Catholic dogma is based on money, control, and opression simply by thinking about the historical context of these creations.
I certainly agree with this. I'll throw in a few points;
- Pope Urban II decreed that one could obtain God's favour by killing Islamic infidels. Also, in addition one could obtain remission from previous sins if they died in battle fighting the infidels.
- Pope Innocent III launched a crusade against heretics in France in 1208. Cathars weren't totally removed from the Church in the things they believed, but the biggest difference was that they believed in direct contact with the divine, placing an emphasis on individual contact. Preempted the need for preists, didn't go down well.
- Walther von der Vogelweide said: "How long wilt thou in slumber lie, O lord?... Thy treasurer steals the wealth that thou hast stored. Thy ministers rob here and murder there, and o'er thy sheep a wolf has shepards care"
- Dominican Inquisitors were just batshit insane, including the formation of such policies whereby each could absolve the other of sin if a victim died prematurely after being tortured ...
- Oh cute side note, a harmless deity from early Roman times (half goat half man), PAN! was demonised by the Church and characterised as satanic. Hence why some people envision Satan to have horns! Cute.
- Anywhore, originally the Church denounced witchcraft as fake but also passed a bill that said if anybod still believed in witches, they were heretics. So if you're a Christian/Catholic but you still believe the town crone is a witch, then you inadvertantly became a heretic yourself. Then in 1400something they reversed that bill and made a new one that segregated witchcraft from your normal heretics. Consequently, any person who argued against the reality of witch craft was a heretic and was insulting the Inquisition.
I can go on and on and on, but it's fairly clear that both religions are fucking ridiculous and are founded on lies, bullshit and power struggles.
That and the Church stole most of its iconography from pagan religions. They stole Jesus's birthday off Sol Invictus (depends who you ask)