Oh SNAP! Picking a Pope with Sex Abuse Solutions in Mind
By Abby Ohlheiser With the conclave starting tomorrow, SNAP warns that a new pope can’t magically fix the Catholic Church’s ongoing sex abuse crisis. Continue Reading →
Tag: pope
The Pope Has Left the Island
By Nora Connor
Pope Benedict completes his pilgrimage to Cuba today, having wrapped up his “pastoral” visit to Mexico, in which he tidily summarized that nation’s struggles with the drug war-industrial complex:
The pope also addressed Mexico’s struggle against violence on the plane trip here from Rome, where he blamed the “idolatry of money” for drawing young people into lives of crime. In a brief speech at the airport here, he also said he was praying for “those who suffer because of old and new rivalries, resentments and all forms of violence.”
And yet, the pope’s approach — framing Mexico’s violence as a personal moral failing — perfectly matches that of President Calderón, a devout Catholic. That message, experts say, will help shift the debate away from policy, and complaints about how the Calderón administration has managed the fight against drug cartels that has led to 50,000 deaths since late 2006.
In Cuba, things are a bit different, if only in the sense that more people have more things to say about the papal visit to the formerly atheist island nation. Continue Reading →
What's in a name?
Elissa Lerner: Of all the exciting things the Pope could be talking about this week (the vote in Sudan, the ongoing agony in Coptic Egypt, even taking a stand on the misuse of the term ‘blood libel’), here is Pope Benedict XVI’s big cause of the moment: Christian names. Yes, it looks like the Pope wants you to consider naming your baby after a biblical figure. Apparently the Apple Martins, Suri Cruises, and Brooklyn Beckhams of the world have gotten out of control. Conveniently, the Pope’s suggestion arrived on the same day as David and Victoria Beckham announced they were expecting. (And we all know, everyone copies celebrity trends.) Continue Reading →
What’s in a name?
Elissa Lerner: Of all the exciting things the Pope could be talking about this week (the vote in Sudan, the ongoing agony in Coptic Egypt, even taking a stand on the misuse of the term ‘blood libel’), here is Pope Benedict XVI’s big cause of the moment: Christian names. Yes, it looks like the Pope wants you to consider naming your baby after a biblical figure. Apparently the Apple Martins, Suri Cruises, and Brooklyn Beckhams of the world have gotten out of control. Conveniently, the Pope’s suggestion arrived on the same day as David and Victoria Beckham announced they were expecting. (And we all know, everyone copies celebrity trends.) Continue Reading →
What’s in a name?
Elissa Lerner: Of all the exciting things the Pope could be talking about this week (the vote in Sudan, the ongoing agony in Coptic Egypt, even taking a stand on the misuse of the term ‘blood libel’), here is Pope Benedict XVI’s big cause of the moment: Christian names. Yes, it looks like the Pope wants you to consider naming your baby after a biblical figure. Apparently the Apple Martins, Suri Cruises, and Brooklyn Beckhams of the world have gotten out of control. Conveniently, the Pope’s suggestion arrived on the same day as David and Victoria Beckham announced they were expecting. (And we all know, everyone copies celebrity trends.) Continue Reading →
Coming Into Existence
Yesterday the Pope followed up his condoms revelation with a more predictable point, one that emphasizes existing Catholic teaching and seems, at least linguistically, appropriate to the start of Advent: protect “nascent life.” From what? “Selfishness and the willful darkening of conscience. Continue Reading →
The Melancholy Rite
Mary Valle: I recently voted in my state’s primary election, because I like voting. Where I vote is in the gym of my local Catholic school, which, since the last election, has closed. Been consolidated. I noticed the cornerstone as I walked in: 1957. Boom times in America; boom times for Catholics. It seems that most of your less-endowed (public and parish schools) date from this era, unreconstructed: chipped linoleum floors, scuffed stairwells, the walls themselves weary with decades of cleaning and children. Usually I’d see colorful bulletin boards and statues and crucifixes and maybe even some students, in uniform, selling baked goods to voters, but this time the walls were bare, the icons removed. I felt a twinge of sadness. Continue Reading →
Pope Suffers On Tour
Mary Valle: Pope Benedict recently touched down at the shrine at Fatima, where the Virgin Mary appeared to children and advised them about hell, Russia and a white-clad figure who would appear in a field of martyrs. Pilgrims still flock to the shine to pray to Mary for help with their ailments. The Pope himself spoke to the gathered, urging them to “overcome the feeling of uselessness, of suffering which wears people down and makes them feel like they are a weight around the neck of others, when in fact suffering, lived through Jesus, leads to salvation.” Continue Reading →
#popearrest
Ann Neumann: A new hashtag on twitter this morning: #popearrest.
I'm Ok, The Pope's Ok
Ann Rodgers, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette‘s smart religion reporter, wrote yesterday that Pope Benedict XVI is proving less conservative than expected. But the main evidence, as we read it, is that the new pope, Continue Reading →