"this is a list of what i should have been..."

so, since pope fever is alive...

"Firstly you have to know what we really want, right? Christianity, Catholicism, isn't a collection of prohibitions: it's a positive option. It's very important that we look at it again because this idea has almost completely disappeared today. We've heard so much about what is not allowed that now it's time to say: we have a positive idea to offer..."

heyyy, my class. nice.

and also, this...
"I'm not a man who constantly thinks up jokes. But I think it's very important to be able to see the funny side of life and its joyful dimension and not to take everything too tragically. I'd also say it's necessary for my ministry. A writer once said that angels can fly because they don't take themselves too seriously. Maybe we could also fly a bit if we didn't think we were so important."

this interview is courtesy of whispers in the loggia, so i can't take credit for being on the ball myself. not like i used to be. [sigh. to have a desk job again and spend more time keeping my fingers on the pulse of the church.] really, i was touched. amazed that someone can speak like that, just brillantly, and touched because i really do get the feeling that he's thoughtful. i don't know, he's a hardliner - but see what you guys think. obviously i think we have far to go from what he says, but i think i like how he chooses to say it.

[i was a little mad at the misquoting of chesterton's "angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly," but it strikes me that it's a case of translation and re-translation.]

i was going to be all, "but he's no JPII!" and link to my favorite speech of his [which i heard live in 2000], and i realized i haven't posted it before. how's that possible? here you go.

It is Jesus in fact that you seek when you dream of happiness, he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; he is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is he who provokes you with that thirst for fulness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle. It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be grounded down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.

mmm. sometimes i think i have the best job ever, you know?