fish hat man stood in regensburg and
spoke to the academy there
where he'd taught theology in the 1970's and
revisited centuries of Islamic, Greek and
Christian philosophy
bavarian pope decried holy wars, forced conversions
and held up Christianity as the
"profound encounter of faith and reason"
in a long dense lecture prone
to wide interpretation
he said, "violence is incompatible
with the nature of god and
the nature of the soul" and
"not to act in accordance with reason
Is contrary to god's nature"
benedict used the word "jihad" and
chose the emotionally and
politically charged arabic word
for holy war or struggle but
never mentioned once the word crusade
it must be nice to be infallible
5 comments:
Maybe his glass house is stone-proof!
Max,
your invocation of the doctrine of infallibility got me curious, so I looked it up (Wikipedia). Technically speaking, the utterances in the circumstance in question evidently would not be considered to fall under the rubric of that doctrine (which is, evidently, more narrowly construed: it specifically involves a Pope's official teaching addressed to the entire church... etc.)
Just in case you were wondering.
More interestingly, evidently the Pope got some of his Islamic history wrong. But I (for one) was pleased he seemed to know more detail about Mohammed and the Quaran than I might have suspected.
At any rate, it does seem a "dialogue of sorts" has been opened; and that the Pope is using doctrinaire utterance in a manner in some respects comporable to that employed by some among his vocal Islamic counterparts. Perhaps the 15th century [or whenever] is with us still.
rc,
good point. if only all religions worked with that in mind.
david,
wasn't wondering, was using artistic license as an ex greek orthodox catholic and philosophic humorist.
glad you were lured into learning about it none-the-less. you're correct about my deviation from strict workings of catholicism. when the pope speaks "ex cathedra" concerning doctrine it's his only moment or moments of infallibility (according to some ancient ecumenical council who were by the way NOT INFALLIBLE).
heck, all religions are make-belief and should be swallowed with a bit of humor and balance in order to be digested.
catholicism rode in on the robes of the christ and the judaic tradition and then - they didn't include the gospel he wrote in their bible when it was found. WHAT ARE THEY HIDING? possibly the fact that he didn't want edifices erected in his name and organized religion watering down or changing his message at all!
the judaic tradition was an original way and originated as a tribal guideline to preserve physical health and protect the gene pool and gathered moss from there.
the islamic tradition was the third bid idea and was a knee-jerk reaction in the mideast to garner control of people, unite tribes and affect major commodity trading of spices and other incidentals.
the god concept is intrinsic in this human species of ours and surfaces whenever the unknown becomes too much to bear or accept for what it is. group neurosis born of chemical changes and meanderings. what the heck, if it works and doesn't hurt people, more power to it.
the most interesting thing about religions in this world of ours is that although they were supposedly instigated to make things better for humans; they may be the very thing that burns this whole species and the rock we dance on DOWN, DOWN, DOWN.
what a shame.
over and out,
:-)
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