Posted on 12/25/2009 1:29:00 PM PST by Stephen25
Pope Benedict XVI was attacked last night while entering St Peter's Basilica for celebration of Christmas Midnight Mass. The attacker, 25 year old Susanna Maiolo, could be seen in footage scrambing out of her seat and jumping over the small barrier that separated congregants from clergy as they walked to the altar. A security guard tackled her to the ground, but she still managed to pull the 82 year old Pontiff down to the ground by his vestments.
The same woman attacked the Pope last year during Midnight Christmas Mass but was tackled by guards before she could reach the Pontiff. Maiolo was taken to a hospital for 'psychological treatment' after the attack, but belongs more appropriately locked in a prison ward.
Fr. Federico Lombardi, who was appointed as director of the Holy See Press Office by Pope Benedict in July 2006, told the press that the attack "was an assault, but it wasn't dangerous because she wasn't armed." To characterize Lombardi's statement as merely absurd wouldn't begin to do it justice. An attack violently dragging an 82 year old down to the ground isn't dangerous? An Assailant doesn't have to be armed with a gun or knife to pose to lethal threat to someone.
This isn't Lombardi's first controversy. In October of this year, Lombardi made international news when he claimed that Barack Obama's Nobel Peace Prize "was greeted with appreciation at the Vatican in light of the president's demonstrated commitment to promoting peace on an international level". This remark was met with dismay and resulted in an outcry by Catholic pro-life groups, with Chicago Cardinal Francis George responding that "the Church cannot betray itself." In response to the outcry over Lombardi's praise of Obama, the Vatican newspaper criticized Obama Peace Prize and ran an editorial correctly noting "the irony of giving a peace award to a president who is continuing to fight two wars begun by his predecessor".
On Christmas, Fr. Lombardi expounded on the Christmas Eve attack of the Pope and tried to downplay the incident, saying “It is impossible to prevent every possibility of something happening, even at close range... If you want watertight security you can’t do that. Being out of touch with people, being far from them, runs against the spirit of his mission so there will always be a risk.”
In 2007, another deranged European, coincidentally also dressed in a red shirt, jumped the barricades and jumped towards to Pope's Jeep . Lombardi at that time also insisted that the man's intent was not to kill the Pope, and explained that the man was taken for "obligatory treatment" by psychiatrists, after being taken to the police station and questioned by a Vatican judge. [See photos of that incident here.]
Pope John Paul II was shot in St. Peter's Square May 13, 1981, by Turkish assassin Mehmet Ali Agca. Fourt bullets hit the Pope, and two bystanders were also injured. Pope John Paul II later met with Agca in prison and forgave him. Agca now claims he wants to meet with Pope Benedict XVI and become a baptised Catholic at the Vatican. He is currently in prison serving a supposed life sentence for the 1979 murder of a journalist, but is eligible to be released in next month, January 2010.
Barely mentioned in the news coverage of last night's attack on Pope Benedict is the fact that 87 year old French Cardinal Roger Etchegaray broke his leg in the attack and is scheduled for surgery "for a fracture to his thigh bone"...
article continues here
Speculation - His Holiness wants few barriers between his person and his flock. How else? His Boss had no bodyguards, and when the Time came, He suffered and died for His flock, no?
Use Vegas Casino security. She won’t get back in again....
Gotta say this: regardless of one’s attitude toward Catholicism, the Vatican and its inhabitants win the prize for costuming, hands down. Or maybe I should say Pope down, from the red shoes to the Swiss guards’ spats. Colorful, to say the least.
Hmmmn.
But notice even you - for all I respect your efforts - are falling for the theme of this story being pushed BY the enemy (the ABCNNBCBS media!)..
Notice that “they” (Obama’s media) are NOT even critizing or condemning the person who ATTACKED him, but rather condemning those who are protecting the Pope. It is during Mass on Christmas Eve.
Does your priest need a Knights of Columbus guard when he walks down the aisle? Of course not.
In this case, where he world’s condemnation of the woman who assaulted him in the “name” of HER “faith” (or was it in the worship of her liberal/socialist/atheist/sexual “religion” that is more accurate?)
Interesting observation. You're right.
Anyone can get a ticket (a certain number are printed) and the public is filtered through metal detectors and x-ray machines when they go to enter St. Peter's Basilica (the machines are used to enter the Basilica on any day)
There isn't really a way to keep any particular individual out - and there is no way to set up barricades inside the Basilica in a manner that would be deemed both secure and appropriate. And I fail to see a viable solution to remedy either.
My best suggestion is that perhaps it is time for the Vatican to reconsider the Sedia Gestatoria - it would keep the Pope up above the crowd... not that it wouldn't have its own challenges and problems.
Prayers up for Cardinal Etchegaray. A fracture in an 87yo is very serious business.
Yes, prayers for the Cardinal. Yes, security needs to be a lot tougher.
With Kevlar body armor, flabelli and tiara. No, I'm not kidding.
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