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New Pope Selected
Freshly Exhumed sends this quote from CBC:
"Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina has been selected as Pope of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics. He will be known as Pope Francis. He is the first Pope from the Americas. The 76-year-old was the runner-up to Benedict XVI during the last conclave. He is well-known for his humility and espouses church teachings on homosexuality, abortion and contraception. He has no Vatican experience."
the first non-european pope
Whoa -slow down there, cowboy!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:African_popes
This guy has said that allowing gay couples to adopt children is a form of discrimination against the children.
So a lot's going to change in Vatican City
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Im not sure its entirely accurate to call Peter the "first pope". The office as such did not exist, and the specific role of "pope" was never acknowledged by Peter or anyone else at that time.
They don't pick a pope that's promising reform, they pick one that will carry on just like the previous popes. Religions appear to prefer stagnation, at least at their upper levels. I wonder if it has anything to do with their age? "Clinging to the past" seems to be a common hobby with most old farts ;)
I like the "he has no previous experience" thing they mentioned. I don't think "have you ever been a pope before?" was part of the the interview...
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
The pope has always been the Bishop of Rome. It's difficult to deny that Peter was the first Bishop of Rome. Whether that makes him the first Pope can be a matter for debate, however. Part of it is how inerrant you believe the Bible really is: there's reason to believe that the "Upon this rock I shall build my church" verse in the Bible was inserted by those wishing to bolster the Papacy's claims.
Your bigotry is showing. I'm not Christian and even I know the Christian answer to this, which is that the old covenant of Leviticus was replaced by a new covenant from Jesus. What is especially ironic is that the Catholic Church does not have anything against homosexuals per se, so long as they are celibate. Which, by the way, is why there are so many homosexual priests, since priests must also be celibate.
-- Two men say they're Jesus. One of them must be wrong. - Dire Straits
Here in Germany the Catholic and Protestant Churches run many hospitals, kindergartens and other welfare services which are funded not by the churches but entirely by the public, yet they impose rules on their employees based on their respective faith, ie. people have lost their jobs for getting a divorce, remarrying, outing themselves as homosexuals etc. The churches make a shitload of money through this system, and because they can publicly claim that they run soandso many percent of welfare services they get to influence public policy and politics. This all works so well because as religious organisations the churches get preferred treatment with regard to taxation, exemption from labour regulations and union rates etc. so they can undercut the private-sector competition. And since they are so good at it there are areas where the churches have a quasi-monopoly in welfare services, leaving workers dependent on them. And as long as the Conservatives are in office this will not change, since the churches offer them, well, let us call it PR support in exchange for keeping their special status intact.
So many people in social industries essentially are forced to live by religious rules without actually being a member of those religions just to be able to get a job. And we all get to pay for it.
Rudolf Hess edited Mein Kampf. He was the very first grammar nazi.
they still think that I shouldn't have a blood transfusion after I crash my motorcycle and lose a couple pints
Not consuming blood is in the Bible (Acts 15:29), and theoretically, it applies to all Christians. In practice, there's nothing wrong with having an expander transfusion to keep your blood volume up until your bone marrow has spit out more red blood cells. In fact, it's safer that way because there's no need for an antigen type match and no chance of catching an STD or other blood-borne infection.
I like the "he has no previous experience" thing they mentioned. I don't think "have you ever been a pope before?" was part of the the interview...
The no previous experience statement isn't to do with being a pope, but with having been part of the Vatican bureaucracy before the election. One of the areas of reform needed is in an apparently corrupt bureaucracy and the last chap was part of the club, having headed up part of it for a decade or more.
This chap has been running an archdiocese in Argentina for the last couple of decades and only set foot in Rome once or twice a year. In American terms, it would be like electing a small town mayor to the office of president, and hoping that the fact he doesn't know how Washington should work will let him clean up the place.
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