Posted on 04/19/2005 5:47:52 PM PDT by Antioch
O.K. We all know the MSM was going to immediately sink their little fangs into ANY papal candidate who dared appear on the papal balcony NOT wearing a rainbow colored Speedo. But who had the most rabid reality distortion field? CBS or the NY Times?
SeeBS
....It was Ratzinger's job as head of the Vatican's Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith - the old Office of the Inquisition - that led to him being labeled by some as "God's Rottweiler."
.... were all hoping for a different pope — a Latin American perhaps — but not an ultraconservative like this," said French pilgrim Silvie Genthial, 52...In choosing Joseph Ratzinger, the cardinals picked the most polarizing figure in the Catholic Church.
...no one was more feared as a chief enforcer of Vatican orthodoxy.
[Ratzinger] has the most appalling reputation around the world as someone who has squashed theology, persecuted theologians - the chief of the thought police, the master of the inquisition....
....During the U.S. presidential election said any pro-choice candidates on abortion should be denied communion -- and so denied any chance at salvation. As a cardinal he took no prisoners. As pope, his unbending promotion of strict, orthodox doctrine now has the stamp of infallibility.
href=http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/19/international/worldspecial2/10cnd-scene.html?hp&ex=1113969600&en=7621121f5a528fde&ei=5094&partner=homepage
NYTimes
... It was not clear, however, how popular a choice he was on St. Peter's Square: The applause for the new pope, w hile genuine and sustained among many, tapered off decisively in large pockets, reflecting reservations about his doctrinal rigidity and about whether an already polarized church will now find less to bind it together.
....His well-known stands include the assertion that Catholicism is the "truth" and other religions are "deficient"; the spiritual weakness of the modern, secular world; a sense that Catholicism is in competition with Islam; and opposition to homosexuality, women as priests and stem cell research.
...Many in the crowd were openly and greatly distressed by the choice of the new pope - widely regarded as an extreme conservative on a wide variety of social issues. This included many Catholics who said he would take the church in the wrong direction.
...One theologian, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, called Cardinal Ratzinger "John Paul II, without the imagination."
....Many others seemed simply perplexed with a choice they saw as moving the church backward. John Paul II, they said, seemed inclined to move the church into the real world. Benedict XVI, they felt, would return to a focus on narrow dogma and doctrine.
Fecal position is more like it.
The Suns are going to win an NBA championship.
Yeah, but he's OUR ass!
They will if they play (consistent) defense.
That's the beauty of the Suns' offense-he doesn't have to score 40 points. Every starter and a few of the reserves are prodigious scorers, so their opponents can't focus on any one man. They never know who is going to pop the ball in. Their weaknesses are defense and rebounding, but if they can do a fair job in those areas, they're gonna be hard to beat.
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