BENEDICT XVI: NEWS, PAPAL TEXTS, PHOTOS AND COMMENTARY

Teresa, I wonder if this article is not rather a backhanded way of getting back at Berlusconi, his party and news media who, after the attack on him apparently made a big Spiel about the attack being the result of leftist poisoning of the atmosphere in Italy, etc. etc.

One can perhaps read this piece on the Pope's style as a very pointed and sarcastic dig at, and a lesson in style for, Berlusconi and co.?





Dear Mags - I can very well see the article as a lesson in style aimed at Berlusconi, indeed. But Repubblica hates Berlusconi perhaps just as much as it is hostile to Benedict XVI, so I can imagine they must have done quite a few commentaries and editorials earlier directly attacking and naming Berlusconi for his rash and imprudent generalizations.

The main target of the article's insulting sarcasm is still Benedict XVI - and the Church - because you do not go out of your way to 'thank' someone for doing or not doing the simple things that anyone with common sense would do or not do in the circumstances. So the net effect is really to say, 'Well, finally someone showed common sense and did the right thing for a change!"

Which, at the very least, is condescending, and a great example of the utterly inexplicable phenomenon of relative morons in the media habitually treating the world's leading intellectual public figure - and living saint - like an imbecile or a schoolboy who does not know better! It's what I detest about commentators like Jeff Israely and John Allen, for example.


TERESA