But I am compelled to point out that there may be a higher purpose in this, IMHO, "wrong" decision of the Vatican.
The terrorists, both Osama, the Iranian clerics, and Iraq's none-too-religious Hussein... all want the arab world to see this as a Holy War.
That's because they have no hope of energizing Muslims any other way, except perhaps with the Palestinian issue- which is why we see both bin Laden and saddam hussein and Imad Mugniyah all too willing to stir up the palestinians. They need some other issue to raise the rabble and get them to topple the authorities in these various Arab nations where they would like to see the current regimes overthrown. the issue remaining to them is Jihad, or Holy War, and they need to get the mobs out there to see not just the Israelis as a threat, but also Christianity.
Bin Laden has tried desperately to get Arabs to see America as a crusader nation, and he is having a hard time of it because many arabs know this country and want to come here because we don't have "religious police" and the Imams' fatwas have no power here. So bin Laden has to overcome the apathy or even the positive viewpoints people have about America in order to make the average Muslim feel as if he personally could become a target of "Crusaders" out to destroy their Ummah.
But how can he spin it to the Muslim world that Christians are waging a Holy War on them instead of the other way around, if the single largest Christian entity they know opposes America's policy? How can bin Laden claim that the crusaders are joining the zionists against Islam if America is in defiance of the Roman Catholic Church, a large chunk of christianity? And the average Muslim doesn't know the World Council of Churches is a joke and not reprisentative of all Christians, either, so if they see those jokers tsk-tsking us, it only undermines Osama bin Laden's message since it looks like America is in defiance of "the Church."
It may or may not be intentional, but that's the effect of the Pope's position. The Pope won't stop us from completing the Gulf War, since it must come to pass and it is right that it come to pass; but wittingly or unwittingly he is helping to deny bin Laden his Holy War by making us look like the loose cannon.
And by denying bin Laden this propaganda victory, he may be denying him new recruits and so, this war may be far less costly and a good deal shorter than if it turned into a full fledged religious war and drew in people who otherwise wouldn't feel threatened enough to fight us.