The Pope

[smokingboot]

I cannot feel pity for the old and rich; death comes to all, and many have suffered it in less timely fashion than he. This is cut out of true respect for those who feel for the Pope, believe in his words and his Church and follow his current struggle, with compassion and faith.



My pity is saved for all the souls struggling through life here and now. Everyone of them begins with dreams, with hope. Many of the soul-less I see on the streets started with starry eyes and big smiles. We all start out innocent, we all break, even as the innocent man on the cross broke ('My god, my god, why hast thou forsaken me?') Some get up again, some don't. And either God doesn't hear, or God doesn't care or God just isn't quite the way the Bible tells us.

I'm a believer, but not in God the Father, God the Son and God the Prohibition. I don't believe in original sin; I believe in original beauty. Everything else is the word of someone trying to clip your wings, to make you smaller, to keep you under control.

Just an old man; we could leave the politics out of this. But politics is nothing more than the study of humanity writ large, and the misery the pontiff's anti-abortion/ anti-contraception dictats may have caused across the planet cannot be forgotten. I will not worship a mad god. I will not worship a god who breaks his own rules. I will not worship injustice and inconsistency masked as mystery. And I will not repent sins I never committed.

The man now dying was a man of his time, of his faith. Perhaps it is too much to expect him to have looked beyond the things he was told. Only his intentions really matter, and perhaps they were kind and strong and good. I'll never know.

Go, old man, with dignity, down the road so many have paved before you in poverty and pain.
When you meet the big one(s), there may be questions on both sides.

May the power of Love come to meet you. May you recognise it.



(Note to self: Must change icon for this one. Laughing evil kitty will give quite the wrong idea.)

Comments

[binidj.livejournal.com]

"... God the Father, God the Son and God the Prohibition ..."
The Hebrew translation of "Holy Spirit" is, apparently, feminine and may be a manifestation of the Gnostic Sophia.

I don't feel joy at anyone's passing, but I do earnestly hope that JPII's replacement will give a little more thought to humanity and a little less to dogma.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

I find Sophia very interesting indeed. When I was ordained, she and Jesus Christ were among the beings I asked to guide me; I dare say they don't find it easy! There's a lot of interesting material about the feminine aspect of God in Judaism and Christianity, most of it ignored, buried or mistranslated.

Re JP's passing, no pleasure but no beating of my breast either. Got nothing against the teachings of Christ (in so much as we can be sure of what he said) but the edifice they raised in his name has a lot to answer for.

[binidj.livejournal.com]

We are of the same mind when it comes to Christianity.