What the Pope Actually Said

Full Text of Pope's Controversial Speech from the Vatican's website and the Official Explanation.

It's odd what finally moves me to post, isn't it?

It's also not that strange that it is so difficult to find the actual words that have fired up such furor in the Islamic world followed by condemnation and explanation from the West. Of course it gets a bit easier if you subscribe. But exactly what does that cost?

Various press outlets (and blogs) are willing to use whatever part of the statement best suits their own purposes. But just giving us the facts and allowing us to draw our own opinions, no that's simply too much to ask in this day and age. We need our news pre-digested. It goes down easier that way — especially when the ultimate goal is to upset.

If I was better editorialist, I would have documented the various articles I read in an attempt to make some sense of this story. But that would be a lot of work. Do I really need to do that? Of course not! Today all I have to do is say what I think and assume that my readers will figure out the rest — or at least not care enough to ask any hard questions about what I'm saying.

Well, that is, unless I was really a journalist. Then all I would need to do is call up everyone I know who might give me a juicy quote...especially people who get my readers bile up. Do I have any readers still?

I have to wonder how many of the readers quoted in the press reports have read the Pope's address — if only the pertinent sections if not in toto.

What would you say if someone called you up and said "Questioning the concept of holy war, he quoted a 14th-Century Christian emperor who said Muhammad had brought the world only 'evil and inhuman' things"? How about when you are told the Pope made that statement?

Is it any wonder all the Islamic world hears is "the Pope called Muhammad 'evil and inhuman'? (Or at least the only the one's who ever seem to get quoted...) How is this anything approaching good journalism? And I'm sorry, but quoting a British Islamic leader or German diplomat responding to the Vatican's official explanation of statement misinterpretation as "an apology" or "fostering interfaith dialogue" doesn't somehow create balance nor make the story any less biased.

Does it read like an apology to you?

And what about the Pope's "clear and radical rejection of the religious motivation for violence"? Why is it that this message somehow seems lost in the shitstorm?

But please don't misconstrue my meaning as anything like an apology for the Islamic gadfly who is using this to once again whine "see how much the West really hates us!" Or how about those in the West who are actually using this as an example of just how out of touch the Pope is with reality. (Like "no condoms, no birthcontrol" isn't quite enough to make that point.)

Yet one should never underestimate just how much viewing and reading interest can be captured on both sides of the Christian/Muslim divide by such headlines as CNN's - "Muslim fury grows at pope remarks", the BBC's "Pope's speech stirs Muslim anger" or Radio Free Europe's's "Pope's Jihad Remarks Anger Muslims".

Then there is blog Religious Freaks' "Pope Angers Muslims–Forecast Calls For Riots". At least it's funny.