you may find interesting this response to the magazine's recent article on the Pope and the Catholic Church. It is from "National Review Online," and is written by George Weigel, the author of a biography of John Paul II.
Here is how Weigel describes himself on his blog; and here's what wiki has. IMO he is knowledgeable about the subject matter of his article.
An der Grabstätte von Kronprinzessin Cecilie
1 week ago
4 comments:
Naturgesetz, thank you for your kind and comforting words for my Dad and family. He was a remarkable man, and we're all drawn closer together for his being.
Thank you so much!
Rick
Comment on next post further down.
D.
I read the Time article when it came out, but read it again after reading Weigel's piece.
First, I believe the title of the Time article and the cover image were sensational and outrageous, bearing little relation to the article. This is common with both newspapers and magazines - the writers have no control over the headline or magazine title. Headlines and titles are designed to attract readers.
Obviously, I view the whole situation as an outsider. I have my personal views about the Catholic Church's reaction to the sex scandals, but don't think they are appropriate to this discussion.
I thought the article was quite fair to the Pope; covered the major issues with some clarity; provided sufficient background; and gave a good explanation of the probable resolutions and their potential impacts. The article certainly gave me a much better understanding of the issues.
I felt that Weigel was overly sensitive to the title and that his comments were therefore prejudiced to the extent that he read things into the article that I just couldn't see. He took a very defensive "blame the messenger not the message" approach - which I believe has unfortunately been true of much of the Church's reaction as well.
Then again, as I noted, I am an outsider with neither his knowledge of the reliability of the writers' research, nor any understanding of the inner workings of the Vatican.
Thankyou for responding. As for Muggeridge's conversion well I dont think that can be explained. From what I read he was a bit of a prude and somewhat right wing in his views of Britain in the new culturally artistic and permissive society in the late 60's early 1970's.
Perhaps we can blame Mother Theresa. I did recently see some old footage of him on a chat show castigating John Cleese and Michael Palin after the film release of 'A life Of Brian' a very funny film by the way. And to think that Muggeridge was supposedly once a satyrist.
As for Tony Blair's late Catholic conversion, well that can easily be explained. For his crimes against humanity (taking Britain to War) he needed to show remorse in order to recover some sort of legacy, which of course he never will now. I would even compare it to a prisoner having taken up religion in order to fast forward his parole.
I suppose that like George Bush, Blair will never have a legacy even though he won three elections. It's even thought that he held such an overall Government Majority for so long because the Conservatives are so hated by the British working classes. So I dont think his Catholic conversion helped him in any way. To me it's an arranged marriage of convenience that didn't convince anyone.
Late conversions just dont seem right to me. Religion is only instilled as a form of indoctrination as we grow up and mature. But whether we accept it as we grow up and think for ourselves is another matter.
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