Posted on 04/02/2005 8:17:39 PM PST by sinkspur
Who Will Be the Next Pope? These 20 candidates have possibilties By John L. Allen Jr. Rome
Prognostication is a notoriously hazardous business, and the trash heaps of church history are littered with the carcasses of journalists who have tried to predict the next pope. Almost no one, for example, correctly anticipated that the archbishop of Kraków, Karol Wojtyla, would emerge from the second conclave of 1978 as Pope John Paul II.
In that spirit, the intent here is not to "predict" who will become the next pope, which is a futile exercise. Instead, the aim is to identify cardinals whose backgrounds, accomplishments, and personalities guarantee they will at least get a serious look as possible papal material. Doing so will illustrate the criteria cardinals typically employ in trying to size up who among their peers might be able to step into the "Shoes of the Fisherman."
Will the next pope be one of these 20 men? Perhaps. But all are certainly under consideration, and that by itself makes them worth a look.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalcatholicreporter.org ...
What is Sanctorum Angelum's devotion?. My latin comes & goes as age takes over..is it a group that is devoted to intervention from holy angels?
Which candidate is THE MOST conservative?
(anti-homosexual marriage, anti-women "priest", pro-life, anti-socialism...)
the who would be the MOST conservative? At least not follow leftist doctrine?
Elitist advocates of top-down government (in church or state) --- who think they have the right to tell others what to do and what to believe -- will NEVER allow the ordinary peons ("we the people") to call the shots ("form a more perfect union") if they can possibly help it.
It is for that reason that the Framers blocked them with the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and set our secular government up according to the republican "we-the-people/bottoms up" pattern as layed out in the New Testament.
So basically the "new world" does not have anyone worthwhile.
"It is very appropriate to point out that capitalism without morals and compassion is a horrible, immoral thing." ~ TWohlford
Watch out for that subtle liberalism.
Excerpt from item below:
"Liberal critics of capitalism often attack it for encouraging greed. The truth, however, is that the mechanism of the market actually neutralizes greed as it forces people to find ways of serving the needs of those with whom they wish to exchange. As long as our rights are protected (a basic precondition of market exchanges), the greed of others cannot harm us. As long as greedy people are prohibited from introducing force, fraud, and theft into the exchange process and as long as these persons cannot secure special privileges from the state under interventionist or socialist arrangements, their greed must be channeled into the discovery of products or services for which people are willing to trade. Every person in a market economy has to be other-directed. The market is one area of life where concern
for the other person is required. The market, therefore, does not pander to greed. Rather, it is a mechanism that allows natural human desires to be satisfied in nonviolent ways. ..."
Volume 39, Number 3; March 1999
http://www.schwarzreport.org/SchwarzReport/1999/march99.html
In Defense of Capitalism by Dr. Ronald Nash
Capitalism is not economic anarchy. When properly defined, it recognizes several necessary conditions for the kinds of voluntary relationships it supports. One of these is the existence of inherent human rights, such as the right to make decisions, the right to be free, the right to hold property, and the right to exchange peacefully what one owns for something else.
Capitalism also presupposes a system of morality. Under capitalism, there are definite limits, moral and otherwise, to the ways in which people can exchange. Capitalism should be viewed as a system of voluntary relationships within a framework of laws that protect people’s rights against force, fraud, theft, and violations of contracts. “Thou shalt not steal” and “Thou shalt not lie” are part of the underlying moral constraints of the system. After all, economic exchanges can hardly be voluntary if one participant is coerced, deceived, defrauded, or robbed.
Deviations from the market ideal usually occur because of defects in human nature. Human beings naturally crave security and guaranteed success, values not found readily in a free market. Genuine competition always carries with it the possibility of failure and loss. Consequently, the human desire for security leads people to avoid competition whenever possible, encourages them to operate outside the market, and induces them to subvert the market process through behavior that is often questionable and dishonest. This quest for guaranteed success often leads people to seek special favors from powerful members of government through such means as regulations and restrictions on free exchange.
One of the more effective ways of mitigating the effects of human sin in society is dispersing and decentralizing power. The combination of a free market economy and limited constitutional government is the most effective means yet devised to impede the concentration of economic and political power in the hands of a small number of people. The Religious Left should be aware that their opposition to amassing wealth and power is far more likely to bear fruit with a conservative understanding of economics and government than with the big-government approach of political liberalism.
Every person’s ultimate protection against coercion requires control over some private spheres of life where he or she can be free. Private ownership of property is an important buffer against the exorbitant consolidation of power by government.
Liberal critics also contend that capitalism encourages the development of monopolies. The real source of monopolies, however, is not the free market but governmental intervention with the market. The only monopolies that have ever attained lasting immunity from competition did so by governmental fiat, regulation, or support of some other kind. Governments create monopolies by granting one organization the exclusive privilege of doing business or by establishing de facto monopolies through regulatory agencies whose alleged purpose is the enforcement of competition but whose real effect is the limitation of competition.
Economic interventionism and socialism are the real sources of monopolies. This is illustrated, for example, in the success of the American robber barons of the nineteenth century. Without government aid such as subsidies, the robber barons would never have succeeded.
Liberals blame capitalism for every evil in contemporary society, including its greed, materialism, selfishness, the prevalence of fraudulent behavior, the debasement of society’s tastes, the pollution of the environment, the alienation and despair within society, and vast disparities of wealth. Even racism and sexism are treated as effects of capitalism.
Many of the objections to a market system result from a simple but fallacious two-step operation. First, some undesirable feature is noted in a society that is allegedly capitalistic; then it is simply asserted that capitalism is the cause of this problem. Logic texts call this the Fallacy of False Cause. Mere coincidence does not prove causal connection. Moreover, this belief ignores the fact that these same features exist in interventionist and socialist societies.
The Issue of Greed
Liberal critics of capitalism often attack it for encouraging greed. The truth, however, is that the mechanism of the market actually neutralizes greed as it forces people to find ways of serving the needs of those with whom they wish to exchange. As long as our rights are protected (a basic precondition of market exchanges), the greed of others cannot harm us. As long as greedy people are prohibited from introducing force, fraud, and theft into the exchange process and as long as these persons cannot secure special privileges from the state under interventionist or socialist arrangements, their greed must be channeled into the discovery of products or services for which people are willing to trade. Every person in a market economy has to be other-directed. The market is one area of life where concern
for the other person is required. The market, therefore, does not pander to greed. Rather, it is a mechanism that allows natural human desires to be satisfied in nonviolent ways.
Does Capitalism Exploit People?
Capitalism is also attacked on the ground that it leads to situations in which some people (the “exploiters”) win at the expense of other people (the “losers”). A fancier way to put this is to say that market exchanges are examples of what is called a zero-sum game, namely, an exchange where only one participant can win. If one person (or group) wins, then the other must lose. Baseball and basketball are two examples of zero-sum games. If A wins, then B must lose.
The error here consists in thinking that market exchanges are a zero-sum game. On the contrary, market exchanges illustrate what is called a positive-sum game, that is, one in which both players may win. We must reject the myth that economic exchanges necessarily benefit only one party at the expense of the other. In voluntary economic exchanges, both parties may leave the exchange in better economic shape than would otherwise have been the case. To repeat the message of the peaceful means of exchange, “If you do something good for me, then I will do something good for you.” If both parties did not believe they gained through the trade, if each did not see the exchange as beneficial, they would not continue to take part in it.
Most religious critics of capitalism focus their attacks on what they take to be its moral shortcomings. In truth, the moral objections to capitalism turn out to be a sorry collection of claims that reflect, more than anything else, serious confusions about the real nature of a market system. When capitalism is put to the moral test, it beats its competition easily. Among all of our economic options, Arthur Shenfield writes,
only capitalism operates on the basis of respect for free, independent, responsible persons. All other systems in varying degrees treat men as less than this. Socialist systems above all treat men as pawns to be moved about by the authorities, or as children
Interesting..I picked him from the list and I know NOTHING!
Well, unfamiliar with these men, anyway.
One word - ARINZE!
With the NCAA tournament ending now would be a good time to set up a "Pope Pool".
Ping for future review.
trust me, I've spoken to him and asked him a few things...
We need a Pope with, uh some cahones as we say here in New York..
Are there no leftist priests in Europe? No abortions occur in Europe? No homosexual activity in Europe?
I only saw three in their 50's!
MOst are in their 70's!
I do not see another 20 year pope no matter who is selected.
It's just politics and has nothing to do with spirituality does it? In that case, they need to pick someone who will endorse birth control for the poor, naive and faithful Catholics in Third World countries who blindly follow the edicts from the cynical, corrupt offices in Rome. Also, the issue of pedophile priests was not properly dealt with and future leaders need to correct evil in their midst with haste instead of enabling the evil.
I wonder how much foreign aid the US could send abroad if it weren't for its capitalistic economy? If JPII was such an advocate for freedom, why didn't he support freedom for the Iraquis and Kurds from the tyrant Saddam? Didn't he see the social injustice going on there?
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