Bush to Give Pope Presidential Medal of Freedom

Reuters ^ | June 3, 2004 | Rome Staff

[Barnacle]

Looking at the recipients, it seems the MOF recipients reflect more on the person doing the giving than the person doing the receiving.

My guess is that the head of of your religion has not received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

It's just a guess.

[ErnBatavia]

Drinkin' tonight? Don't forget to set the alarm....tomorrow is First Friday, and Mass is at 0800 - sharp!

[Barnacle]

After which the Pope will go into an anti-American rant, lambasting Bush for all the evils of the world. You heard it here first.

Are you going to post a followup on your ill fated prediction when it doesn't come to pass?

What kind of time frame can we ascribe at wich point you'll admit you are wrong?

[F16Fighter]

"I think that Catholics who think, are able to come to their own conclusions, independently of this award...As for Catholics who don't think, I suspect they won't care one way or the other."

Never underestimate flattery ...regardless of one's intellect...

IMO, Dubya and his handlers are obviously hoping to pluck more than a few Catholics who would otherwise be fence-sitting until election.

[Barnacle]

The Pope gets a Medal of Freedom for being one of the most vocal opponents of the Iraq war?

I doubt very much that that will be the stated reason. JPII and the Bush administration enjoy a very warm friendship.

Rather than making disparaging remarks against the pope, why not listen to the real reasons tomorrow and get back to us on it?

I expect part of the reason he is being awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom is for his role in bringing down the Soviet Union. You can deny that fact, but you'd do so in ignorance.

[Barnacle]

Looking at the recipients, it seems the MOF recipients reflect more on the person doing the giving than the person doing the receiving.

Clinton is not awarding the medal to John Paul II. Bush is.

What does that say?

[solitas]

Anyway, a pope can't call for wars and the killing of people wholesale .. He has to be a pacifist, because it's very un-Popelike to cheer war.
D'j'ever hear of the Crusades?

...but he can't call for a new Crusade.
His predecessors did enough damage calling for the LAST (first) Crusades.

Ah, and had he "stuck to his gig" in the 80's, as you so smugly asked him to do, maybe the red hammer-and-sickle star would still be flying over the Kremlin, and Lech Walesa would be sleeping the eternal nap in an unmarked grave somewhere in Poland.
The operative word here is POLAND (his birth country; what a coincidence! no?) - other countries have greater and lesser problems than what Poland had and they're all pretty much still the same as they were before he got into office. Hands-up everyone who's surprised.

[Barnacle]

The Pope isn't an American. Why should he get it?

Wow! You mean you have to be an American to receive it?

You'd better call the White House before it's too late!

[gilliam]

The libs have been waiting 25 years for this Pope to die, and a new Pope ascend the chair of Peter. A "modern" and "progressive" Pope.

Probably won't happen. Chances are it will be a conservative (but not too conservative) bishop from a non-European country.

[anonymous_user]

Hey, thanks for being the 15th person to point that out to me, and your "ignorance" comment really touched my heart too.

[EDINVA]

simple: Unlike many other US awards, the Presidential Medal of Freedom can be awarded to non-US citizens

[Lauren BaRecall]

I think that whatever GWB does from now until the election, will be held suspect by a number of people.

I would agree with you about this situation's looking mighty suspicious if the President had chosen this occasion to first show up on the papal doorstep. However, GWB and the Pope have an established relationship.

For one thing, President Bush consulted with Pope John Paul, in addition to other moral leaders, when he was considering fetal tissue research. He recognized the Pope as a moral authority, and respected him greatly as being a man of faith. The President ended up choosing a middle road, rather than the one recommended to him by the Pope, but by his seeking spiritual guidance, GWB showed he was really making an effort to come to the best moral decision. This was not for votes.

The President and the Pope have a relationship, and from what I've gathered about these two men, there are both spiritual and temporal ties that bind them. Maybe GWB wants to honor John Paul now, while he's still President - just in case the election doesn't go his way. We don't know for sure, because we're not two flies on the wall, so it's a possibility.

Ronald Reagan also had ties with John Paul. Both Reagan and Bush responded to the inner mandate of defeating evil.

[Lauren BaRecall]

He'll be a Pope who won't swerve from doctrine one iota. Other than that, only God knows. Literally.

The names of possibilities get tossed around, but I don't think any of them have ever won. I won't be surprised if we end up surprised. Again. :o)

[CanisMajor2002]

Barnacle says in two posts:
My guess is that the head of of your religion has not received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
and
Clinton is not awarding the medal to John Paul II. Bush is. What does that say?

I find your my-religious-leader-is-better-than-your-religious-leader comment condescending and not catholic in the universal sense.

That said, I will expand my point. If you check the lists at http://medaloffreedom.com, you'll note some of the recipients. I obviously am being selective to further highlight my point:

Recipient	President
Pope John Paul II	George W. Bush
Charleton Heston	George W. Bush
Roberto Clemente	George W. Bush
Dave Thomas	George W. Bush
Bill Cosby	George W. Bush
Nancy Reagan	George W. Bush
Fred Rogers	George W. Bush
William Joseph Brennan	William J. Clinton
Thurgood Marshall	William J. Clinton
George Mitchell	William J. Clinton
Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter	William J. Clinton
Lloyd Bentson	William J. Clinton
Wesley Clark	William J. Clinton
George McGovern	William J. Clinton
James A. Baker	George H.W. Bush
Ronald Reagan	George H.W. Bush
H. Norman Schwartzkopf	George H.W. Bush
Colin Powell	George H.W. Bush
Richard B. Cheney	George H.W. Bush
Friedrick A. von Hayek	George H.W. Bush
Isaac Stern	George H.W. Bush
Earl Warren	Jimmy Carter
Warren Christopher	Jimmy Carter
Walter Cronkite	Jimmy Carter
Lyndon B. Johnson	Jimmy Carter

My secondary point is that the Pope, whom I agree with most people here when I say that he deserves the PMOH for his anticommunist activities in the 80s, will be in both good and dubious company when he is added to this list. My primary point is that the Bushes used proper judgment in choosing who properly fulfills the requirements of the PMOH, that is, those people who actually perform meritorious service in support of our country.

[ntnychik]

I gather you don't like Catholics that much, huh???

I can't fathom where you would get that idea. I admire Pope John Paul II, and I admire Mrs. Bat's support of the president.

[JesseHousman]

...a tiara that was first used in the 8th century is somehow necessary to the papacy...

Then why, pray tell, was its use suspended after 1,000 years?

Was it for the sake of ecumenism, modernization or what else but to show the world that the Roman Catholic Church was stepping down from ecclesiastical splendor to join the crowd?

Many things have changed on earth, but Jesus Christ and the Holy Trinity do not.

Many of the cafeteria Catholics no doubt think that our Savior wears Nikes and how dare you call me a protestant! It took Martin Luther only 500+ years to transform the Roman CAtholic Church into the shape he desired!

[kevao]

Are you going to post a followup on your ill fated prediction when it doesn't come to pass?

If the Pope doesn't say something negative about the President or the Iraq war, I'll be very pleased, and happy to admit I'm wrong.

But I would be even more pleased if the Pope would repudiate all the rabid anti-Americanism being shilled by his underlings at the Vatican. But I'm told he either cannot, or will not, do that.

On this and other threads, I've seen the Pope referred to as the "Highest Authority". Seems he has authority aplenty, everywhere, that is, except in his own Vatican.

[gilliam]

Text of the Holy Father's address to the President

The Pope is in charge of all the Bishops in the Church, they take authority from him (if that is what you mean).

As for theology, the Pope, when he speaks authentically on faith and morals is infallable, but talking politics and giving advice to follow the guidence of the UN, is not within that sphere. When he talks politics, he is simply giving his opinion. In Catholic theology, the people responsible for determining if a war is just are not are the civil authorities who are privilaged to the top secret documents and other briefings of the intellegent agencies. You can't expect a Pope or anyone outside the 'loop' to know all the facts pertanent to determining if a war is just or not. For more information on the Catholic 'just war' theology, see: Just War Doctrine

In the case of Iraq, the Pope expressed what he has always expressed, that we should not go to war instead work within the International community for peace. That is his political view on ALL wars.

[Romish_Papist]

That’s true, he does resort to insults at times, but of course here he is right. You are a nut.

To claim, suggest, or even to repeat that a tiara that was first used in the 8th century is somehow necessary to the papacy would imply that the papacy didn’t exist until the 8th century. Such a claim really makes one a Protestant. Yet, you deny being a Protestant, despite being one. You therefore deny reality, which is the definition of being a nut.

patent

That sir, is the definition of "owning" someone. Well done. :)

[Romish_Papist]

Got any web resources or books on Reagan and his relationship with Il Papa? I've always wanted to read more about it, but everything I've come across is pretty tainted by liberalism.