Worst…Pope…ever
It’s hard to decide whether Pope Benedict XVI is the worst pontiff ever, or the best thing to happen to Catholicism in years.
Following hot on the heels of a bizarre series of flip flops over whether to accept Holocaust-denying bishop Richard Williamson back into the Church, Benny has let fly with another zinger -” calling on Africans to reject condom use which can even increase the problem of AIDS.
Historically it’s been rare for heads of state to criticise the Vatican, yet this pope has already been condemned by European leaders twice this year -” and it’s only March!
When first elected, pilgrims and tourists flocked to Rome to see their new Pope. But three years in, crowds attending public audiences for Benedict are far smaller than those that attended even a sick John Paul II.
Vatican insiders are grumbling that they might have made the wrong decision. Unfortunately Popes cannot be sacked -” till death do they part.
In the meantime, Benedict’s reign seems to have sent a message to Catholicism’s more retrograde forces that it’s time to knuckle down on Church liberals and dissenting Catholics.
Readers will be familiar with the furore over Brisbane’s rebel priest Father Peter Kennedy.
Yet his is just one of many stories from around the world.
When Catholic Caring Services, an independent UK adoption agency, began placing children with same-sex couples in compliance with new equality laws last year, the Bishop of Lancaster not only banned parishioners from raising money for the group but is now trying to evict them from church-owned buildings.
When American priest Father Geoffrey Farrow came out as gay and preached against Prop 8 from his pulpit in California, the Church not only sacked him but then threatened to withdraw all funding from a multi-faith social justice group that had offered him a job.
In Nigeria and Ethiopia, the Catholic Church is enthusiastically supporting campaigns to further criminalise homosexuals and silence their supporters -” which is pretty bold when you consider the Vatican State age of consent is a scandalous 12 (or 15 if it’s your priest doing the fiddling). Remove the beam from your own eye.
Yet if thinking Catholics had any doubts about papal infallibility, this Pope has crystallised them, while the pace of GLBT rights throughout Catholic Western Europe and South and Central America only continues to grow.
Andrew
The thing to consider here is context. The AIDS epidemic in Africa is primarily of heterosexual making. Deeply ingrained cultural concepts of male viriliity needing validation by a man having sex with scores of women, even after marriage, are fueling the crisis. The tragic scenario of an infected man infecting his wife who in turn infects their unborn child is playing out time and time again. The Pope’s comments should be viewed within the wider context of the Catholic Church’s doctrine of expecting sexual monogamy within marriage. The fact is that while condoms do have a part to play in combating the epidemic, there are clearly other strategies that must be put into practise. Condoms alone will not win this war.
Howdy Andrew.
I like your writing. Apart from looking evil, the latest pope is, er, well … evil. The quickest way to send the catholic church into submission is for pope Benny to keep up his current ramblings.
The obvious flaws in the church’s dogma appeals only to right wing conservatives and moral crusaders who care not for anyone but themselves. It has nothing to do with faith anymore … if it ever did.
I only just finished writing about a similar subject.
http://theaustralianheroindiaries.blogspot.com/2009/04/harm-minimisation-christian-thing-to-do.html
Hi Philippe, I do realise that Catholics hold the Popes to be infallible in matters of spiritual doctrine, not in personal action- I brought up the Borgias to be flippant.
The current Pope is certainly causing many Catholics to question that infallibility with his pronouncements on abortion in rape cases and on contraception.
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Andrew, you seem to misunderstand the concept of Papal Infallibility. Infallibility, as defined explicitly in the 19th century, involves the Pope issuing a solemn on faith/morals. You are confusing this notion with impeccability – i.e.: freedom from moral fault, or sin. A declaration on the truth/falsity of something is DIFFERENT from personal liability to sin in general.
If only the world is liberal as it supposed to be; if only we all have the same rights since no particular one owns the damned world; just if only, just that.
Then what Mr. Pope has said would not matter just as it does not matter to me and will never. I do not subscribe to his faith nor see him as a leader… So his non-sense blabbings are just a whiz of wind to me. But we cant ignore such idiocy.
And oh! no human is infallible. Let him swear he never had sex since he took the oath of celibacy.
PS- Avaaz (the international equivalent of GetUp!) is running a petition calling on the Vatican to stop condemning proven AIDS prevention strategies like condoms. At the time of posting 100,000 people have already signed. Help them get to 150,000- http://www.avaaz.org/en/pope_benedict_petition/
Hi Timothy, I think even a very cursory glance at history would reveal many, many Popes who were fallible in their morality and faith. The name “Borgia” comes to mind.
>”Yet if thinking Catholics had any doubts about papal infallibility, this Pope has crystallised them,”
Thinking Catholics have NO doubts regarding papal infallibility, as thinking Catholics already know that the Pope’s recent comments are not an instance of papal infallibility. Pope Benedict remains infallible regarding morals and faith.
God bless…