generalspeaking

Low-Flying Political Traps

That beatific smile for all those candid cameras betrays the helplessness of an animal trapped in the headlights of an oncoming locomotive full of petitioners and demands and pleading and emotions each one of which represents a pitfall he will not easily be able to extricate himself from. He treads warily, wearily through those minefields of political adversity cloaked in religious piety. This mortal, God's human emissary, not to be confused with another.

It's a tightrope, all right. One of those vibrant, vexing situations where no matter what you do, whatever extent of self-abnegation is indulged, desperate attempts at empathic compassion, someone will take offence. Too many competing interests, too much tribal and religious and territorial and political entitlements at stake. In this, there is no middle ground, no room for civility or inclusion or forgiveness.

To a man of God whose position exemplifies forgiveness, compassion, peace and humility this inexplicably human place on Earth, however holy, is a dilemma and a burden. Popes are meant to bear burdens. And so he does his. Clearly he cannot be seen to be on one side or the other in the Jewish-Arab, Israeli-Palestinian conflict of religion, geography, politics. Clearly he owes his deepest concerns to the fate of the dwindling Christian minority within the Holy Land.

Clearly as God's designated and confidentially-infallible representative he has an obligation to humankind, for the God he represents sits in judgement over all of humankind, and the good Pope Benedict is his witness to events unfolding before his hapless eyes and uncertain perception. He may exhort to reason, but faith owes little to reason. Those competing interests in the geography of the Holy Land remain there passionately on faith.

And with the human tendency toward fiercely defending their territory from the unholy predations of invaders, foreigners, intruders, strangers, infidels.

Labels: Human Relations, Middle East, Political Realities, Religion

posted by Pieface @ Thursday, May 14, 2009