Armchair Pundits

Habemus Papam!

Pope Benedict XVI.

In what I’m sure will not be a surprise to those who know me well, I would like to state for the record that I am not Catholic. So I am giving a strictly Protestant view of the new pope.

I think it was a good choice. As my Catholic friend said, “conservative and German, two good qualities.” I think, as many do, that it was a clear signal that the Catholic church has no intention of watering down its theology to appease the liberals within the church.

I did a quick scan through the channels the other night to see what some of the talking heads were saying about the new pope. I started at the top, which just happens to be MSNBC on our cable system. Keith Olbermann’s show was on and he was discussing the pope with some noted scholar. I have heard some complaints about Olbermann and his Countdown show, but I have never really watched it so I couldn’t comment. But, after watching about five or ten minutes of his coverage on the election of the pope, I feel I can say that he should return to ESPN. He sat there most of the time with a pained expression on his face and asked the most biased questions ever. “Do you think the cardinals really meant to pick such a conservative pope?” Yes, Keith, I do. “I’m by no means an expert on this, but I have studied it recently….” Meaning: I know absolutely nothing about religion, but I read a couple articles on the web and now feel qualified to speak to the issue. They basically kept coming back to the idea that because certain groups do not agree with church teaching, the church should change to accept these groups.

I ended my news scan on Fox News and the O’Reilly Factor. O’Reilly was talking about the media’s reaction to the new pope with former CBS reporter Liz Trotta. Bill thought that the media would very quickly start attacking Benedict. Liz said that it had already begun. She said that MSNBC was interviewing every “expert” they could find who was opposed to Pope Benedict. She was right. As I mentioned, just a minute earlier I was watching MSNBC and the coverage was definitely slanted.

Once again, the liberal media just doesn’t get it. Did they actually think that the new pope would greet the cheering crowds and say “you know all that moral stuff we have been saying for the past couple hundred years … just ignore that.” I would write more, but it would be pointless. So, I’ll just say that liberals do not understand Christianity and leave it at that.

Despite the media’s coverage, I must say that I have enjoyed watching the whole process. It has been very interesting. And, I am looking forward to watching Benedict XVI in action.
Just so you know, I decided to post this instead of the two postings that are sitting on a floppy disk amongst my work papers. They were humorous, but not that good. But, if you ever want to hear about my Jerry Springer white-trash moment at Walmart, just ask. It is a sad, but humorous commentary on our society.

posted by Squirrel @ 7:23 AM