Pope Resigns

[Alanz]

Yep he'd get my vote

[The Mad Collector]

That would be so good

[Joolz]

I'd resign from my job if the boss took all the credit without turning up...

[Tonyblack]

Well at least his boss has a good aim!

[chillicamper]

Why bother choosing a new pope anyway.

Couldn't all the priviliged members of the 'Vatican Private Members club' do what they preach - forego the riches of this world, and hand the Vatican buildings over to be used for something more useful like housing the homeless

[Alanz]

That's agood idea Chilli, I think they should do away with them all, If you want to pray to him upstairs then it's up to you isn't it, you don't need a big house and lots of people in skirts telling you how to do it.That's where it has all gone wrong on this planet most of the trouble on it is caused by Religeon.

[Who's Wee Dug]

How about giving all the looted nazi gold they were holding for them as they were their bankers in WWar II back to the rightful owners or there decendants.

[simmonds91]

on another note id like to say I think being a nazi is fine, as long as they don't kill other people or lash out, everyones entitled to an opinion

That was a joke, wasn't it?

haha, yeah, god forbid people have true freedom, to have their own opinions, likes/hates due to whatever circumstance. Anyone who thinks certain things whether they do something or not are evil right? (the pope did something like pray to the dead jews? I don't think any christian can bad mouth the guy when the very religion is based on repentance) But hey, nazi thinking doesn't have a good rep so I understand, personally (PERSONALLY) I don't think it matters either way what the guy is.

Religion does not cause war, ignorant people that want power cause war and use religion as an excuse, the crusades for example were mainly a quest for more land and political stuff. And i agree that the pope and co. don't need those grand temples, especially when god is omnipresent and those ceremonies needn't be held in such a place.

[raisindot]

haha, yeah, god forbid people have true freedom, to have their own opinions, likes/hates due to whatever circumstance. Anyone who thinks certain things whether they do something or not are evil right? (the pope did something like pray to the dead jews? I don't think any christian can bad mouth the guy when the very religion is based on repentance) But hey, nazi thinking doesn't have a good rep so I understand, personally (PERSONALLY) I don't think it matters either way what the guy is.

Funny, but I don't think my relatives who died in the Holocaust would have forgive the millions of Nazis who might not have killed anyone themselves but had no problem letting other Nazis (perhaps even the current pope, who was a member of Hitler Youth and fought against the Allies in WWII) ship them off to Auschwitz. Christian repentance is all well and good, but I think my dead relatives (and the 12 million others killed by the Nazis) would have much preferred that these Christians not committed the acts in the first place. Considering that the Catholic Church didn't raise a finger to condemn these atrocities, it's kind of hard to forgive and forget, y'know?

Religion does not cause war, ignorant people that want power cause war and use religion as an excuse, the crusades for example were mainly a quest for more land and political stuff. And i agree that the pope and co. don't need those grand temples, especially when god is omnipresent and those ceremonies needn't be held in such a place.

Religion itself might not cause war, but certainly all of the Judeo-Christianic-Islamic faiths endorse war. The God of the Old Testament has no problem with this Israelites massacring other tribes. Jesus himself said, "I come with the sword." And the Koran is full of references to jihad and battles as a means of advancing Allah's will. The Crusades were NOT a quest for more land; would use would England have had for owning Palestine, a land over 2,000 miles away? They were religiously based, designed by Christian kings to win back Christian holy sites and to massacre thousands of Jews and Muslims who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

[Dotsie]

If you hear it said about one of the towns that the Lord your God is giving you to live in, that scoundrels from among you have gone out and led the inhabitants of the town astray, saying, "Let us go and worship other gods," whom you have not known, then you shall inquire and make a thorough investigation. If the charge is established that such an abhorrent thing has been done among you, you shall put the inhabitants of that town to the sword, utterly destroying it and everything in it—even putting its livestock to the sword. All of its spoil you shall gather into its public square; then burn the town and all its spoil with fire, as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It shall remain a perpetual ruin, never to be rebuilt. (Deuteronomy 13)

[Jan Van Quirm]

'Nuff said Dotsie - although Christians will argue (backed up by 2 millennia of anti-semitism now ) that it's Jesus' teachings and not the OT that they follow.

Which is still no excuse of course as packing up for sword-wielding fun in the sun in Palestine and lots of yummy high tech Muslim goodies as booty to 'liberate' won hands down over 'turn the other cheek' of whatever ilk... And when you really get down to it Christianity and Islam are both major 'schisms' of Judaism anyway as they all recognise most parts of the OT, including Deuteronomy, and the eye for an eye bits. The Hebrew God really does have great enrollment options when you get down to it

To be scrupulously fair to the outgoing chap he was allegedly conscripted at 14 into the Hitler Youth (which was compulsory by 1941 when he went in). He did serve as ground crew in the Air Force in 1945 but deserted when the Allies (US) reached his station, was sent to a POW camp for a few months and went straight back into seminary for priestly training when he was released. Apparently his 14 year old cousin was 'officially' killed in a death camp - the boy had Downs Syndrome (the Ratzinger family was allegedly rich and influential but this kid was still terminated for having sub-standard genes in effect). That's all from Wikipedia and whilst it's not a great testimony to human rights, it's certainly doesn't make him a die hard nazi, just a teenager scooped up in the system like any number of young men who went to war on the Allies side without too much interest in the politics necessarily?

War is hell and people living under threat, regardless of right or wrongness, will do what they have to do to survive, even while they hate it, unless they're very strong and motivated to rebel or otherwise put themselves and their loved ones in the sticking place where non-conformity gets you killed.

[TinatheConfused]

I am really happy that I don't "Belong" to the Catholic church any longer. My cousins are a'dither wondering about "why, how, when, wha???"

[Dotsie]

Jan, I wouldn't argue with you over the fact that Ratzinger had a choice of either being Nazi or dying, if he was anyone but the Pope. But how could he deny his God (or rather what his God stands for) to save his own life? Not very Pope-like.

[Broccolee]

I hear you,Jan.My mother was born in '36.All my family on the german side were 'good ariers',and my grandfather first worked for Zeiss Jena in prescision technology (also used for weapons) in the development,then as a motorbike soldier in the field information during the war until he was invalided out (lost a leg).My eldest uncle was enrolled at age sixteen and killed by gunshot in the front line two weeks later.You'd think they were on the right side,huh?

Nope.My gran was asked to an inquisition because my mum had played with a girl whose family turned out to be Jews.They thought my mum had passed on information or assisted them.She was only little,but still she was in danger for PLAYING with the 'wrong' child.My grandpa said a few things some people didn't like to hear-they had to pack up and flee in the night because someone had tipped them off the SS wanted to come in the morning...
My mum told me about how it used to be...you used to lie in bed at night,hearing the boots on the stairs in the house next door,hearing the cries,the splintering,the shots.You used to cry for fear under your blanket,praying nobody had said anything wrong about YOU.

Wrong,that could be buying and hoarding too much bread,picking an apple,(the father of my kids's teacher was shot for that),listening to the wrong radio programme,not sending your daughter to the Hitler Jugend,saying,'I wish Josl Rosenberg hadn't been picked up last week.He didn't repair my watch before...'
Everybody could be a spy.The grocer.The boss.The neighbour.Your own child.

Nobody was safe,ever.Everybody was scared.Of course they knew what was happening.
So what would you have done?Gone over to your neighbours and said,'leave them alone,they are my friends'.Do you think that would have stopped them?No,they would have just taken you,too,and maybe made you watch while they dragged your own children out of their beds and shot them first.And what good would that have done?There were a lot of movements against Hitler,and they wouldn't have gotten so far as trying to assassinate him if they hadn't got a lot of support from those people that are sneered at now for"not doing enough".There were hundreds of people hidden away behind double walls,in cellars and attics and fed off the meagre rations of the family.If they were found,not only those who were found died,also those who had hidden them did,too.
It wasn't only the people in the camps who were freed by the allies.It was the whole nation.And it makes my blood boil to hear snotty young people shaking their wise heads saying they really hate Nazis and why didn't the Germans do anything against them?They don't hate Nazis.They don't know what it feels like to be scared every day,to be hungry,not to know what you come home to from school,not to know if yours is the door the boots will stop at next.THEN you hate Nazis.

And isn't it a bit much to demand pope-like behavior from a scared 14-year-old?You,of course,would probably behaved differently....or would you?It's easy to be brave and stand up to your beliefs from a vantage point of a free country and 65 years.

[Broccolee]

....What I mean is,even if he now is a pope,he's still a human being,and definitely was at age 14 and as a young man.I don't like the catholic church myself,but I think it's a bit much to ask to expect immaculate behaviour from a pope in hindsight.He isn't God.He's human.As we all are.That's the POINT of belief in god.If we were all perfect,what would we need it fpr?