POPE ALERT!
Pretty much every major news organization is reporting that the Pope has been taken to the hospital. What was believed to be the flu, has apparently turned out to be something worse.
We, along with everyone else, wish the Pope the a speedy and complete recovery.
That being said, this brings up a serious issue that has been around for a good bit of time given the Pope's ill health and age: should the Pope step down and allow someone else take over?
Some see considerable value in this idea. After all, the Pope's health has made it very difficult for him to travel or speak - two skills pretty necessary for active Poping. Also, there is something very disconserting about have the Vicar of Christ, the voice of God on earth, having "larynx spasms". Think about it, the Pope has Parkinson's Disease, very little control over his extremities, and now he is having larynx spasms - the next thing know the Pope is gonna fall over into the Chair of Peter, have a larynx spasm and all of a sudden its Catholic dogma that Trix are for kids and adults eating Trix end up getting excommunicated.
There is, however, one humongous problem with the Pope stepping down while still alive: the new Pope would have to deal with there being another Pope around all the time. I mean, its not like you go from being the head of The Church to just sitting on the sidelines, like you can just turn off that direct line to God. Imagine you're the new Pope, you're out there, kicking it and make some statement about contriception. Next day you get up, you're feeling good, grab a cup of coffee and the paper and see on the front page that the old Pope came out and said that actually God had talked to him and you're completely wrong. Then you're stuck either accepting what the old Pope said and essentially have to pass everything by him first from then on, or you have to publically get in a fight with an old retired man, with Parkinson's Disease, who also happens to have been Pope - its a no win situation.
Also, I could very much see the current Pope ending up alot like Jimmy Carter in his post-presidential years. I'm not talking about the kindly old gent building houses around the south for the poor, I'm talking coddling up to dictators and the like. I mean the last thing we need is the retired Pope going around to Damascus, or, God forbid, Canterbury, shaking hands and having talks with dictators and vicars, telling us everything is peachey, because then 5 years later, bam, the Anglicans will have the A-bomb.
So my vote is the Pope stays. Life is complicated enough without an ex-Pope watching your every move.
We, along with everyone else, wish the Pope the a speedy and complete recovery.
That being said, this brings up a serious issue that has been around for a good bit of time given the Pope's ill health and age: should the Pope step down and allow someone else take over?
Some see considerable value in this idea. After all, the Pope's health has made it very difficult for him to travel or speak - two skills pretty necessary for active Poping. Also, there is something very disconserting about have the Vicar of Christ, the voice of God on earth, having "larynx spasms". Think about it, the Pope has Parkinson's Disease, very little control over his extremities, and now he is having larynx spasms - the next thing know the Pope is gonna fall over into the Chair of Peter, have a larynx spasm and all of a sudden its Catholic dogma that Trix are for kids and adults eating Trix end up getting excommunicated.
There is, however, one humongous problem with the Pope stepping down while still alive: the new Pope would have to deal with there being another Pope around all the time. I mean, its not like you go from being the head of The Church to just sitting on the sidelines, like you can just turn off that direct line to God. Imagine you're the new Pope, you're out there, kicking it and make some statement about contriception. Next day you get up, you're feeling good, grab a cup of coffee and the paper and see on the front page that the old Pope came out and said that actually God had talked to him and you're completely wrong. Then you're stuck either accepting what the old Pope said and essentially have to pass everything by him first from then on, or you have to publically get in a fight with an old retired man, with Parkinson's Disease, who also happens to have been Pope - its a no win situation.
Also, I could very much see the current Pope ending up alot like Jimmy Carter in his post-presidential years. I'm not talking about the kindly old gent building houses around the south for the poor, I'm talking coddling up to dictators and the like. I mean the last thing we need is the retired Pope going around to Damascus, or, God forbid, Canterbury, shaking hands and having talks with dictators and vicars, telling us everything is peachey, because then 5 years later, bam, the Anglicans will have the A-bomb.
So my vote is the Pope stays. Life is complicated enough without an ex-Pope watching your every move.
posted by BertramWooster at 9:54 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home