Change, Mistakes and the Ultimate Risk: Obama and the Vatican

The "PJXXIII Service Project" - High School kids helping the needy

One is not blameable for mistakes, we all make them.
A mistake is not a crime, it is only a miscarriage of judgement. - Mark Twain

From WashingtonPost.com:

"Senator Obama's family is proud of the service of his grandfather and uncles in World War II - especially the fact that his great uncle was a part of liberating one of the concentration camps at Buchenwald. Yesterday he mistakenly referred to Auschwitz instead of Buchenwald in telling of his personal experience of a soldier in his family who served heroically," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton this afternoon in a statement, which also clarified that the great-uncle "Served in the 89th Infantry Division that Liberated Ohrdruf, a Subcamp of Buchenwald, the First Camp Liberated by Americans, on April 4, 1945."

But for conservative bloggers, Obama has finally gone beyond the pale. "Sickening," huffs Red State. "Barack Obama must be the most gaffe-prone politician in memory," reports PowerLine. "The Young Gaffer Sees Dead People," chortles Hot Air.

From Obama's website: "I'm asking you to believe. Not just in my ability to bring about change in Washington...I'm asking you to believe in yours."

Maybe a change in Washington would be a president who admits mistakes. "The most gaffe-prone politician in memory" - that's a severe case of ADD. Bush's gaffes are legion - and filled with dire consequences. Remember the "yellow cake" gaffe? It helped send us to war. Remember, when five solid weeks after the exposure of Abu Ghraib, Bush could not pronounce it? Bush never admitted mistakes. Oh, wait, he did admit that "Mission Accomplished" was a mistake, sort of...three years after it had taken place. Bush not only makes mistakes he is a mistake.

And by admitting his mistakes, Obama at least proves that he's listening to what is being said about him. The test of a true dimwit is that when called a dimwit, he doesn't respond - at all. For eight years, Bush never even attempted to prove that he wasn't what many people thought he was. He made a gaffe when he said he didn't read the newspapers. When people joked about that, it took his wife to defend him.

Mistakes and change. Along with them come a great risk.

Angelo Rancalli was a risk-taker, even in his advanced age. He was elected pope because of his age: cardinals thought his age would make him an interim pope. They didn't expect him to call an ecumenical council. They were frightened when Vatican II threatened to change things.

“I see you. I feel. I have looked into your eyes with my eyes. I have put my heart near your heart.” John XXIII called for change because he actually listened to his flock.

Il Papa Buono - The Good Father

Obama calls for change and all the conservatives are frightened. They not only have a history of hating change, with the religio-political environment of today, they hope to regress back to a time that never was and to "values" that restrict freedoms. Obama has talked of a Washington not fettered to lobbyists. Conservatives love lobbyists. Lobbyists ARE Washington. Special interests ARE Washington. Corporate interests ARE America!

What risk is Obama taking by tauting change? The ultimate one? Let's hope not, but people who don't want change can be as desperate as people who want it. Pope John XXIII didn't live long enough to encounter the results of his risk. Neither did John Paul I. After his election as pope, rumors flew about in the Vatican that even greater changes would be made, in staff as well as in policy and liturgy. The sedevacantists* had begun to form. The pope was found dead in his bed only 33 days after his election. He was a relatively young sixty-five. The cause of death has never truly been established.

Shocking? Only by today's standards. During the two millennium of popes, seventeen were murdered or allegedly murdered. The ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries were particularly dangerous times to be a pope. John Paul's predecessor, John VIII, was allegedly poisoned and clubbed to death. John XII was murdered by a jealous husband.

Barack Obama certainly knows the risks he's taking in his bid for change as well as the presidency. Many conservatives would secretly rejoice if he were erased by a white supremicist group.

And as for the "values voters", well, let's put it this way: do you think Pastor Rod Parsley would lead a memorial service for Obama?

Just a thought.

"Hey, his middle name IS Hussein!

Some people's idea of "change"

"Take THIS for a change!"

*Sedevacantism is a theological position embraced by a minority of Traditionalist Catholics which holds that the Papal See has been vacant since the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958 (or, in some cases, the death of Pope John XXIII in 1963). Sedevacantists believe that Paul VI (1963–1978), John Paul I (1978), John Paul II (1978–2005) and Benedict XVI (2005-) have been neither true Catholics nor true popes, but rather notorious heretics, by dint of having allegedly espoused Modernism. As we stated in an earlier post, actor and director Mel Gibson is an avowed sedevacantist who has built a sedevacantist church on his estate in Malibu.