Template talk:Catholic Church sidebar

Template

This is a template, available for placing on relevant pages. Use the code {{Catholic Church}} It should display on the right. Xandar (talk) 15:50, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Work needed

This is a good start - I've done a bit of rejigging, removing duplicate links and moving things into more appropriate categories. An awful lot of what's linked to here is still general Christian material rather than specific Catholic Church material; this all needs looking at to see whether it is relevant enough to the Catholic Church specifically to be in this infobox, and if so whether there are articles and sections relating specifically to the Catholic Church's approach to the topic which can be linked to, rather than current links which are often to a general article relating to the topic in Christianity in general, or in some cases (e.g. Salvation, Saint) across all religions. TSP (talk) 20:00, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

I guess I should be entering this on the WikiProject Catholic discussion rather than here in view of the above admisssion. I was surprised that "Contemporary Catholic music" was skipped, but on the other hand, there just is no article on regular Catholic music, so what are you going to do? (I was looking for an article that contained info on the RC music revolution, in the US, anyway, that followed the 1990s publication of "Why Catholics Can't Sing." There is none. Student7 (talk) 21:37, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Should there be a "History" section to the template?

At a minimum, the following articles should be in the template: History of the Roman Catholic Church and History of the Papacy. --Richard (talk) 07:58, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Should we include Papal Primacy, Papal supremacy and Papal Infallibility?

Seems logical to me that these articles also belong in the template. --Richard (talk) 07:59, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Size

There were several formating errors that I have corrected in the template as it was before. Please do not revert without discussion. Here are some comments concerning the consensus debate for size that took place elsewhere:

"...In my opinion the template is too wide. It really intrudes into the article, in fact dominates it...At this point it is wider than many other templates. These boxes are not supposed to dominate the article, but are simply a placeholder of a list of links to aid the reader. Please reduce its size." --RelHistBuff

After some further debate, the smaller size was agreed upon. Xandar, what are you refering to when you say the picture is now "too small" - compared to what? Which template are you refering to? This is much closer to standard: on the general Christianity box the image is a mere 100px. -- Secisek (talk) 01:36, 24 January 2009 (UTC) -- Secisek (talk) 01:36, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

The Christianity box is however an extreme of thinness, ugliness and user unfriendliness. The size of the Catholicism template is comparable to many in Wikipedia. Most article-top Infoboxes are actually wider than this, so where the idea comes from that this is "dominating" surprises me. In addition, the thinner the box, the less information can be included easily and accessibly. The present width is okay for me, but I do not see the purpose of the 11 point type face rather than the former 12pt. The 11 point is very hard to read, particularly on screen resolutions over 800. The emphasis should be on clarity, and ease of use for readers, not all of whom have perfect eyesight. therefore we should return to to 12pt text. Xandar 11:56, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Can you cite some examples where consensus has backed the 12 pt? Or the larger width? I saw this box was based off the Anglicanism box that I helped designed. I liked what you did here. The Anglican Communion box in turn adopted a number of the features of this templates, only to have a number of editors promptly complain that the width and 12pt size made for a template that - in the words of one editor - "takes up half the screen of every article (and) is badly formatted." There were some content concerns, as well - which was what I was really intrested in debating. I conceded the format changes in the interest of getting people talking about the content. As soon as I conceded to the format changes, all objections to the content seemed to be dropped. Wikipedia can be a strange place.

I agreed with consesnus and came back here to improve the template per our discussion over there. Thoughts?

I'm not sure who created this "consensus" or when. But we don't seem to have been involved on the Catholicism pages. In any event, I think the wider box format is more common on Wikipedia and doesn't seem to create the problems raised. Examples of the wider format can be seen at Presentation of Jesus at the Temple, or France, or World War II or Byzantine Empire, or Roman Empire or Catholic Ecumenical Councils.

Personally I dislike the skinny boxes, especially at the top of articles, and as I said above, I think they contain less information, necessitate smaller print, and are harder to read. I use several computers, and while on those set at 800px resolution, 11pt print is okay. At the more modern, higher resolutions it becomes practically unreadable, and I'm not particularly short-sighted. I don't see a great reason for uniformity across Christianity articles. Xandar 14:02, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

I am aware that there has been no consensus on size here because this navbox (which duplicates another) is almost entirely the work of you and two other editors - hardly enough for a consensus as such. That was why I brought the changes here, to see if there was consensus for them here as there has been elsewhere. So far you are the only real opposition, with one editor saying he would like to see the box smaller still.

All I know is I copied this box's format and it touched of more complaints than almost anything else I have ever done here at Wikipedia. I gave into consensus and I have further proposed that the Navbox footer should go on pages in the series that already have info boxes in the lead, the vertical nav box could go on series articles that have no infobox, and the portal link should go on related articles that are not in the series as such. Would you support such a policy?

See below for a more pressing issue. Which links do want to bring over from the old nav box? Do people want to merge from the old to the new...or from the new to the old? I like the new box on the whole - enough that I think something like it should be the standard for all Christian nav boxs.

The size issue will solve itself as more people weigh in on it. - How could you comment on the size, but not the more pressing merger? -- Secisek (talk) 19:28, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

These are issues that don't ring alarm bells until a radical change occurs - then everybody shouts. The present template is IMO a good combination of picture, information and links, which is a lot better than the scrappy-looking infobox or photo plus narrow template stuck on beneath it, as seen on some other articles. On merger of templates - see below. Xandar 23:28, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Merge

While looking over the Category:"Part of a series on" templates, it has come to my attention that there was already a {{Roman Catholicism}}. These two templates need to be merged as they are intended to serve as the primary Nav Box for the series. How should we procede? -- Secisek (talk) 01:56, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

I didn't even notice the existence of the apparently-older {{Roman Catholicism}} template. Perhaps that is because it isn't listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Catholicism, and tends to have been stuck away near the bottom of most of the few articles it has been used in, such as Vatican City and Pope Benedict XVI. In these positions it is "neither use nor ornament." As such, I think it should be merged into the present template. Regarding the usage of templates, the collapsible Template:Catholicism can be used at the bottom of any article including those with an existing navbox, however. I agree this is best used on maiinstrean Catholic articles without a separate navbox. However in some circumstances, e.g. joint interest articles like Eastern Catholicism, this, Template:Catholic Church, should be present even if it is not at the article head.

The narrow template actually links to a range of topics not in this one, and vice-versa. Pope is on both> if we need a subsidiary on this topic, we should keep "Papal primacy" but not "Primacy of Saint Peter". "Scripture" and "Apocrypha" don't need to be carried over, as they're covered in "Biblical canon". Nor are "Encyclical" and "Papal bulls" really needed as essential links here. "Mass" is better covered by the "Eucharist in the Catholic Church" article linked here. As for the rest of the "Practices and Beliefs" section ..."Monasticism" and "Saints" are already linked. I don't think we need links to "Ascetiscism," "Ritualism" or "Veneration". "Penance" and "Transubstantiation" could also be left out as either too general or too technical. I think we should add "purgatory" and leave out "Prayer for the Dead", which covers the same territory in a less Catholic-specific manner. I don't think the "controversy" and "Important figures" sections need to be in the template at all. I'm not sure about the "History" section. It lionks to a hodge-podge of articles of varying quality and relevance. We already have a link to "History of the Catholic Church", that should do. As for the "Mary" section. We have one link to the range of Mary articles reworked by Ambrosius. Perhaps we could add Immaculate Conception, and Assumption of Mary to this template from the list.

From this template we should lose History of Theology and "Apologetics" (too general), "Preaching", which links to {{Sermon]], (too general), "Symbolism" (not central enough), and the second link to "Liturgy" (which links to Christian Liturgy rather than the Catholic-specific article.) Xandar 01:13, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with all you points and carried out the merger, except I did not add the addition Marian links. -- Secisek (talk) 21:53, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Interesting. Now the template is much more Rome-centric in its world-view, with a distinct lack of controversy. The Pope should be pleased.Brian0324 (talk) 22:52, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Brian0324, I hope you have been well. Criticism is on there. The content was discussed. What specifics would you like added or removed? It IS Rome-centric, but it IS a Nav-box for the Roman Catholic Church.

The template is over-used at present. -- Secisek (talk) 23:09, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

The way that this template has changed has only minimized the controversial elements and highlighted the universal claims of the church of Rome. Hardly the broad scope of perspective that it once had from an outside perspective.Brian0324 (talk) 14:43, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I think the Template is not a place to debate the religious issues, etc. and as is, there is a criticism link anyway. The purpose here is to have links that relate to Roman Catholicism not debate it. I think the template works pretty well as is now, if it uses the 12 point font as on this page. And given that it says Roman Catholic at the top, it should probably refer to Roman Catholic issues. If you are unhappy about Roman Catholicism in general, you should not modify the template about it, but perhaps you should write a blog... History2007 (talk) 14:51, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

The current template doesn't refer to the issues regarding the Roman church either in history or in current events or theology to differentiate it from other Christian churches the way that it once did. If anyone thinks that there might have been a reformation or a counter-reformation or some issues around Papal supremacy - then you won't be linking to those things from here. It's just very safe and quite honestly diluted right now. Thoughts?Brian0324 (talk) 17:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I think there are so many subtopics (we can come up with 500) that they can never all be included. But that is obviously beside the point here. The real debate (and I am not going to debate it) would have been about "using tone to send a message". I think what you call diluted is what I call moderate and what you may have called non-diluted I would have called politically charged. One thing I am sure of: we could debate this for the reign of 3 more popes and never agree. I think it is a "moderate=diluted" template because a template is not intended to send a message of dissent via tone. The criticism link already addresses all the points anyway. So I think it should be left as is. History2007 (talk) 03:03, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Papal supremacy isn't even mentioned. I AM an outsider, Brian0324, you should know that, not that it should matter. What would you like here? Reformation and Counterreformation? We can add them? What else? -- Secisek (talk) 13:41, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and Papal supremacy is a Rome centric topic, so it will make it more diluted/moderate. And if that gets added, how about Papal infallibility? Then how about 200 other topics? If you keep going that way you will get "The Wallmart of Templates" where the template includes everything, but will require a serious diet before it can be used on various pages, due to its obesity. Reformation is certainly part of history and does not make sense to be a button on the template by itself. History2007 (talk) 14:20, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

I would feel better about adding Reformation and Counter-Reformation if we had East-West Schism on here. This should really before the Top level articles from the project. Brian0324, I am uncertain I see how the template has shifted in tone or flavor. Can you offer some suggestions? -- Secisek (talk) 20:26, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Post merger

First serious point: Why not add the Marian links? The Virgin Mary is an essential part of Roman Catholic thought. The Marian links absolutely need to be there. There is a whole series of articles on Mariology that need to be there. Xandar was trying to say it ever so gently, so let me say it emphatically: It does NOT make sense to have a Roman catholic template without Marian topics. Second point: Does using this template require a visit to the optometrist? The font is so small, it is just too hard to read. History2007 (talk) 23:14, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

The main link to Mary is still on there and there is a seperate Nav box for mariology already: {{Roman Catholic Mariology}}. Do you want to have the same set of links reproduced here? -- Secisek (talk) 23:20, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

No. But I think that the two I suggested are quite important and often controversial issues. Three Marian links is not too much, I think. Xandar 23:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. I'll add them. -- Secisek (talk) 23:30, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I was surprised that the Mary link leads to Mariology. I think the link should go to what it says (the what you say is where you go concept), namely: Blessed Virgin Mary (Roman Catholic) and adding the one link Mariology itself will then clarify the issue. As is the template has huge amounts of unused real estate and the word mariology can easily fit therein. Those in the semi-conductor industry spend their entire life doing the oppoiste of this type of design. They try to fit the most in a small amount of space. Here there si so much blank space and so many small words.... Just looks inefficient. History2007 (talk) 23:46, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Xandar? Those are elements of your design. Thoughts? -- Secisek (talk) 23:50, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Ok, here is a suggestion. The logic is as follows: If we were to make a list in terms of importance of figures/people in Roman Catholic thought, undoubtedly the trinity would come first and the order is usually given as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Then who comes next? It is probably not Saint Augustine. I think it is the Virgin Mary next. So we should have the one word Mary next after the Trinity, and it should lead to the Virgin Mary page. And there is space for it. Now in the Theology section: the link to Mariology is absolutely well placed, because Mariology is the area of theology that deals with Mary. So we should have Mary as one word, just after the Trinity and change the label Mary to Mariology further below. Then we will have a logical design. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 00:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

This is getting complicated. The Trinity is in the Theology section. Placing Mary Directly under the Trinity would tend to give a false impression in my opinion. (A number of people, including many Muslims think that Catholics believe Mary a part of the Trinity.) I would like to see the Mary links together, and Theology is the best heading for them, (rather than Background) but perhaps not directly after the Trinity. I agree "Mary" should link to BVM (Roman Catholic), then a link to "Mariology", then either "Assumption" or "Immaculate Conception." The IC is more important, I think. Xandar 00:32, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Xandar, I think you are absolutely right that placement of Mary next to the Trinity would confuse some people. And since you agree that there is need for both a Mary link that links to Mary and a Mariology link that links to Mariology, then it will be best that you place both those links in the least confusing manner yourslef. If we debate it anymore, we may get into a heated agreement so let us just leave it in your hands to add both links as appropriate. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 00:45, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good. Be bold. -- Secisek (talk) 03:12, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Talking about bold let me again point out that the ratio of the bold font at the top of the template to the fine print that forms the body of the template is really large and ophthalmologically speaking creates brief periods of asthenopia as the inner eye muscles try to focus on dramatically different fonts. But let us wait for the Mariology link to be added, then worry about a new article perhaps titled: "Computer vision syndrome in Roman Catholicism". Cheers History2007 (talk) 08:50, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I've rearranged it. And yes, I still think 12pt is better as a font size here. Xandar 12:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

The link sequence and content look good to me. As a minor issue I would have guessed that just saying Mariology would have been enough because the context implies that it is Roman Catholic. And that would have bought you some space for another link. You could have even said Mary. But these are minor issues now. Cheers History2007 (talk) 12:29, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Every one who complained about the 12pt was encouraged to come here and comment. Nobody has posted a word. If you want to try the 12pt font, I will not object. --Secisek (talk) 12:39, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I added the 12point demo-model to this page. It is effectively the same size real-estate as the other one, but more readable. I also made a narrower template, so we could all see what that looks like. While still not as slick as the Cigarette boat design of teh much older tmplate, this takes less space on pages where it will show. Please provide comments on which of teh 3 choices is best. I prefer the narrower template with 12 point fonts. Unless there are objections, I think we should make that the actual template in a day or two. Cheers History2007 (talk) 23:34, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Secisek, I think the new template you added based on the narrower demo-model I had posted here now looks right on the 3 browsers that I tried it on: IE-explorer, Netscape (yes, yes, I still have that) and Firefox. I think those are the 3 major browsers in use (I do not have Opera installed, but its market share seems to be small), and I tried a couple of different text display sizes and they looked ok. IE-explorer still seems to like to take too much horizontal space, but by and large it should work. But now that you have added additional lines, you may even be able to make it even narrower. Please compare the spacing to the demo-model on this page and you will see the difference. Your version is actually more readable than my demo-model, but takes up a little more space. But no big deal really. However, I had deliberately removed the noinclude from the demo-model, and when you pasted it, it is no longer on the page. Did you intend to avoid it? If not, please add it. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 14:01, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

By the way, I just noticed that the word Rite repeats 6 times at the end of the template. It should really be factored out and that will probably buy you some more space. History2007 (talk) 14:31, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not keen on the narrow version, which isn't substantial enough for the top of articles, and makes the picture too small. I noticed in Pope Benedict XVI where it is in second position, the two templates were identical in width two days ago, now the difference is very marked. Xandar 17:26, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

What do you think should be the standard size for a picture in a navbox? Again, what do you mean "too small". I like the new size and adopted it for a number of other templates already. -- Secisek (talk) 18:22, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

I do see Xander's problem with Pope Benedict XVI where a much wider template would have been much more visually pleasing. The main issue is an attempt at one size fits all design: usually a design failure. Most designs are about tradeoffs. The narrower template is more efficient when it is displayed on pages where real-estate is a problem. There were previous complaints about template size before, even on this page. But sometimes one wants a really large template. When Ambrosius and I built the Mariology templates the only way we found was to have two templates, one much larger than the other. So my feeling is that with minimal effort a much wider/larger template (with even more buttons) can be derived from this one for use on major pages, and this will be standard template. The other one can be called Roman Catholic Large or something to that effect. Tha will also solve the problem with more buttons. As they say: don't use elephant gun to shoot mosquitos so the wider template will be too much for many smaller Wikipages. History2007 (talk) 23:17, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

That would mean two templates again though. There's no real problem with that if they're comptible in content and design. Anyway, its just my preference. Lets ee what others think. Xandar

If you look at the Roman Catholic Mariology and Roman Catholic Mariology (long format) templates you will see that it worked well there. The long template is just too large to use in most articles, so the standard one is used. There is even a very small template that does not overwhelm the smaller articles such as Marian prayers, whose size is less than the large template itself. And I keep the two templates consistent, and have not had any problem is doing so. I think your point about the need for a large and impressive one is valid, and we should have a larger one as well. History2007 (talk) 19:45, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, the real question is content. What should be on here that isn't? I think we need about 50-100 Top priority articles from the wikiproject - which is about what we have. I am quite satisfied with it as it is at present. We also have the footer already for use on articles where this template is to big or small. Again, lets see what others think before we bang off a series of templates. -- Secisek (talk) 21:09, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

To begin with, the content can be identical and the larger template is just for visual effect, as Xander wanted it. In time, say 2-3 months if/when there are other suggestions the larger template can grow, while the standard remains almost the same. I see no urgent need for new items on the standard template. If you make a document too long, people will find it harder to read. History2007 (talk) 21:50, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

That would be very easy to do. Have one identical, but the old width, and call it Template:Roman Catholicism2 Both could be on the Wikipedia:WikiProject_Catholicism page. Xandar 01:50, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, of course. History2007 (talk) 03:34, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I dislike the idea of these vertical boxes altogether. I usually remove the Anglican one where it cramps the text or pictures. People tend to add them with no consideration of the size of a section or the position of images, disrupting the look of a page. Also, generally many of the articles listed in the box have no relevance to the article itself, though this may apply only to the Anglican template. On the other hand, I am easy with horizontal templates at the bottom of articles, where they act like the after-matter in books. qp10qp (talk) 16:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

There is always, of course, one way to remove all problems from a template with a single stroke: delete it! But that aside, I think the vertical/horizontal issue happens to be a matter of personal taste for I happen to find teh horizontal ones hard to see and manage. And I have, in many cases learned several things from various vertical templates. It may also have to do with the way each of sets browser side-bars and teh screen size, fonts, etc. History2007 (talk) 17:03, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The vertical boxes are better in most circumstances since they are most easily seen and used. The ones at the bottom of articles, collapsible or not, are only used by people who already know they are there and will scroll down to reach (and then expand them). In other words I consider the bottom boxes pretty unfit for purpose 95% of the time, since the purpose is to provide unfamiliar users with a quick and accessible range of links. Problems with vertical boxes can be solved with good placement. That is one reason why I like to use such boxes at or near the the top of articles, where there is more room for them or they can act as infoboxes as well. Xandar 10:52, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with that assessment too. History2007 (talk) 11:12, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Looks good... but.....

This template looks good now. Then I clicked on a few of the links. Ouch!!! Some of the links are hardly about Roman Catholicism. E.g. Salvation talks about at least 7 different religions and groups! These include not only protestants, but Judaism, Islam and eastern religions. What is that link doing in the Catholicism template? I think it is there because there is no article on Roman Catholic teachings on Salvation. Should it remain there? I think not.

Then as I clicked on various links and saw that many of them have tags that complain about one thing or another. E.g. lack of references, lack of neutrality etc. etc. The Marian items such as Assumption, Immaculate conception, Mariology, etc. seem in reasonable order, but the rest is not.

My conclusion: the representation of many Roman Catholic items in Wikipedia is really sub-standard. There is a great entrance to Roman Catholicism now, but many of the rest of the articles need real help. Is there a group that can focus on improving this?

I typed this comment here because it is the entrance. If you know where it should be posted again, please re-post it. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 23:13, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Minor style tweaks

History2007 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) seems keen on the use of the undo button, while not so keen on the use of edit summaries. This is just a note to say that the style / code tweaks here and here have no semantic impact, so unless there's some layout-specific reason for undoing them then I'll be adding them back in. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:51, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually, this template is a MAJOR template that is used a lot of places. Xander, as the unofficial mayor of the Catholicism page, had worked on it to make it work. Any change to this page may make many other pages change format. Please wait 2 or 3 days for responses before making any changes. Please post your "proposed" template here for a review. Thansk. History2007 (talk) 20:27, 15 September 2009 (UTC)