The Pope
 

Before I begin.. I hope the moderator doesn't see this thread as a political/religious thread meant to cause problems.

One of the most loved person on Earth is in very bad shape, some reports that his holiness has passed. I can't think of anyone else who has sacrificed, survived so much pain in life, or influenced as much as Pope John Paul II. He is by far my biggest hero and consider him as an idol. If each person were to be as nice and helpful as he was, this world would be living in harmony. I am very sad by today's news... and pray for the best.

Well said. I am not Catholic, but attend Catholic mass locally on occasion. I agree wholeheartedly.

I was raised catholic but don't go to church now. Even so, your consideration of the Pope as an idol is 180 degrees out of phase with everything I remember. The Pope is the Vicar of Christ, but not an idol. Perhaps an inappropriate choice of words.
regards,
mark

Granted, the old man's sinking fast.

Charismatic fellow really,but his reactionary views have done incalculable harm to the hidebound monolith of which he is the head.

The following should be read,it was written by a Catholic Priest.http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,348471,00.html

me too. i think he is close now... i bet it's pretty somber over there...


:grim:

This article is crap. Sorry!

Well, I can only submit that the people who accept the Catholic church as it is are the people keep it as it is.

Your response is very Expressive but lacking in content.

My main beef with him is the way he handled the child molestation issue. IIRC, Cardinal Law (a prince of the church who might have someday become pope himself) was trying to shift blame to his subordinates, wrote letters of recommendation he KNEW were absolutely false and undeserving, shuffled child molesters around, etc, etc. Fine, we all know that Law did a lot of things that were definately against church teachings, etc. What did the pope do to fix that besides allow Law to write his own punishment? Now if he had fired Law, I would agree that the corruption ended with Law. However, he basically let it go where it would and that makes me wonder if it did end with Law or does it end with the pope. IOW, can I still trust that man? This was not a simple clerical error or a slip of the tongue. This was a lack of firm action and admittance of guilt.

I don't consider him as an idol. I am a cradle Catholic and still practicing Catholic. I admire him for what he accomplished. Did he make mistakes? Sure. But, I can say this that he did not shy away from saying what needed to be said. This was to Castro, Bush Gorbachev et al. History will show that he was a magnificant Pope.
The sexual abuse scandal was terrible. But, what else could he have done? The way it is described is he were complicit in it.

The pope has died. 2:37 PM eastern time.

I don't know. Admit that the mistake was made and take action against Law. As President of the company, if my VP was doing something illegal and immoral and I just let him decide his own punishment and not fire him personally, what does that say about me? As far as I am concerned, he was complicit in it seeing as how he did nothing to seperate the church from Law.

No one can deny what Law did was both immoral and illegal. Yet, a prince of the church just says "I followed bad advice." Well, that makes it all better, doesn't it? :rolleyes: No kidding, you followed bad advice. Even I know better than to do what he did. So, if the prince could do something like that and try weasel out of it and the head of the organization does nothing about it, what am I supposed to think especially when that organization is supposed to show some sort of moral leadership? Wasn't there something about not lying? If the pope will not defrock his senior personnel for doing something indefensable, what should I think of the leader of teh group?

I think that had this happened earlier in his Papacy, I believe he would have handled it differently. His health was a factor.

I'm not Catholic, or even Christian. However, I think it is foolish to deny the impact this man had on world events during his papacy. He was instrumental in helping to end the communist control of eastern europe. He transformed the Catholic mass from inaccessible Latin-only readings to interactive audience-language events. For good or bad, he broadened the reach of the church ministry, and attracted a generation of young people into the congregation. It would be easy to condemn him for his handling of the sex scandal, but that would miss the totality of his contributions.

Look at Nixon. He was actually a pretty amazing President in some regards. He almost single-handedly got China to open to the west. But, then there is that other thing... Clinton had some tremendous contributions as well, but the first thing that comes to mind is impeachment. These two leaders had active roles in the negative legacy they have left to history, but the Pope has never been accused of directly influencing the rediculousness regarding the sex scandal. There are certainly people who should pay for all of that, but it would be a mistake to toss out his broadreaching accomplishments due to something awful that occurred during his tenure.

I don't care a lick for his religious teachings, but the man was influential as few others during his life. I hope his legacy honors this.

I think Latin mass was changed before JP II.

John Paul's encyclical on life and his on faith are I think very profound. Like them or not, they do not shrink from a logically consistent position, given JP II's understanding of Christianity. Uh, that doesn't mean there cannot be other logically consistent positions that do not agree with his. I'm just saying his is a clear and consistent argument. I sure appreciate that.

Also, JP II was the man who formally accepted that the Church was incorrect in it's description of the physical universe. He also said that the theory of evolution is not inconsistent with the Christian Bible. He also accepted his church's measure of guilt for the holocaust and for his church's historical discrimination against Jews. He formally changed that policy, too.

The man was brilliant and brave. I hope his successor lives up to that standard. The world will be better for it.

I don't know. He could have easily fired Law or just give the order. Not sure how hard that would be but it would have gone a long way to showing that the church was not above the principles it claimed to champion. Further to that, if he was not up to the task, he should have stepped down and allowed someone else to do what needs to be done. Lets face it, he knew what Law did was wrong but did not condemn it. All of his good works is one thing. This is another issue. This is a basic issue to the church and cannot be ignored.

In my mind, he didn't want to fire Law because that would be an admission of guilt that might or might not have bankruped the US catholic church and have more financial reachings to the Vatican which does have a lot of money from all the people willing money to the church. As such, he traded his principles for financial security. All the good works will not make up for the trade because if he doesn't have his principles, what seperates him from the average politician that promises the sky, stars and moon but you find him one day giving you the high hard one without so much as a reacharound?