The Pope is dying

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Q Cubed

Isn´t the Pope a commie? IIRC he was against the Iraq thingie....

which is why all the commie leaders absolutely loved him.

...pssst...you don´t need to take every one liner seriously

[Saint Marcus]

The whole let's pretend to work together but not actually accomplish anything ithing s really big amoung the Christian churches right now.

I blame the Protestants for the failure of this noble cause.

What's he done this year?

Oposing Bush.

though I reckon he'll get the award for his whoel ouvre.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
Oposing Bush.

I thought they got over that with Carter.

[Saint Marcus]

I thought they got over that with Carter.

that's why I said that he's likely to get the award for his lifelong commitment to peace.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus

Oposing Bush.

Can I have a nobel prize too?

[Drake Tungsten]

You have at least one more year to be recognized, BeBro. Good luck!

[BeBMan]

OTOH there are bigger Bush bashers here....

But I show a lot of good will

[alva]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Interestingly, if the Pope actually had the power to ban condoms a huge drop in new AIDS cases would emerge because they'd be following the Church's other teachings (abstainance).

I doubt even the pope has that power

[St Leo]

Allah has smitten the infidel Caliph for his attempts to prevent a holy war on the secular pigdog leadership of Iraq.

[Ned]

Seeing the pope hang on the way he has despite his failing health is agonizing. He should set a precedent and retire. It would have been nice if he retired at 75 and set a tradition that that is the upper limit.

The college of cardinals should set down some rules like this, IMO.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus


I blame the Protestants for the failure of this noble cause.

.

Yeah, trying to be fair to women and homosexuals is really, really dirty.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by mindseye
Yeah, it's awesome to see that even though he is dying, he was able to summon up enough strength to denounce homosexuals one last time.

His faith is clearly one based on a profound love of humanity.

Good point -- there is no honor in this kind of blatant hypocrisy.

But then again, I can't really wish for someone to die.

[Jack_www]

I know that the pope is dieing just by looking at him on the news. Why cant he retire? Someone that sick is very limited in what they can do.

[Shi Huangdi]

http://www.catholic.org/cathcom/worldnews.php?ID=2097

VATICAN CITY, OCT. 3, 2003 (Zenit.org).- Responding to media speculation, one of John Paul II's closest aides, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, says there is no reason for alarm over the Pope's health.

The prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, who lunched with the Holy Father on Wednesday, said: "The Pope is a strong man, lucid in mind, with a clear view of the world."
"Of course he has real difficulties with pronunciation, especially when he is tired, and he has problems walking," he said Thursday at a book presentation.

Today, the Pope had a full schedule of audiences. In the morning he received Jean Obeid, Lebanon's Foreign Affairs Minister; three bishops from the Philippines; and the Redemptorists participating in their congregation's general chapter.

The Pope was also to receive in audience Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller, who is in Rome to attend the European Union's Intergovernmental Conference.

Cardinal Re's statements were made after some news media exaggerated statements made by Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna.

In an interview on Austrian national radio, the Vienna archbishop said that "even a life as full and intense" as this Pope's "has to end sometime." He said that that was something quite natural, but what is unusual is that it should occur "in everyone's view."

"Everyone is seeing a sick Pope, incapacitated, who is dying -- I don't know how close he is to death -- who is nearing the last days and months of his life," the cardinal said. He added that the image of the frail Pope "is a difficult sign for our society, which idolizes health."

Cardinal Schönborn's interview was published by an international agency under a headline, "The Pope Is Dying."

A spokesman for the Vienna prelate, Erich Leitenberger, said later that Cardinal Schönborn's statements should be taken "philosophically and not literally."

The previous day, John Paul II's personal secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, said that the press had distorted a private comment made by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, to the point that it made the German weep.

On Thursday, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer came away from an audience with the Pope relieved that his health seemed better than recent reports had suggested, the news portal News.com said.

"It's not like in the media. He is not on the brink," Downer said after the Vatican meeting.

[JCG]

He should retire, but since the tradition usually doesn't have Popes retiring and dying "out of office", he'd have to set the first precendent, and probably neither he nor the upper Church officials want to do that...a stubborn but respectable position.

But well, all in all, he's just another human being (even for those that think he's God's "man" on earth), with all the virtues and vices of a mortal, he's not perfect nor is he right in every area (nor does he pretend to be).

At least, in plenty of other causes, he did have good intentions and tried to act upon them.

Btw, It wouldn't be the Pope's hypocrisy, it'd be hypocrisy in the religion as a whole, if that was the matter...

([devilsadvocate] which, for those inside, isn't, as the Church believes it can realistically follow the "love the sinner, hater the sin" idea...[/devilsadvocate]...won't try to explain how, since I'm not anti-gay nor anti-gay rights, so I'll leave it at that...)

In any case, if you're not Catholic, anything that the Pope says/writes on his deathbed about all this doesn't directly affect your personal life & ideas...