With his deep-set warlock eyes and raptor-sharp grill, it's difficult to get a warm and fuzzy feeling looking at Pope Benedict XVI, who this weekend finished a five-day trip to Brazil, the most populous Catholic country in the world. Worse, then, when the conservative theologian also known as Ratzinger opens his mouth and makes comments he eventually regrets: on Islam, for example, or recently, on abortion. And now, in a few tossed aside words on his way back to Rome, Benedict managed to royally piss upon the indigenous American civilizations that thrived for thousands of years before the arrival of Columbus, suggesting they wanted to be colonized, raped, enslaved, and converted by Christ's soldiers in the 16th Century. That's just wrong:
Touching on a sensitive historical episode, Benedict said Latin American Indians had been "silently longing" to become Christians when Spanish and Portuguese conquerors took over their native lands centuries ago.
"In effect, the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture," he said.
Many Indians, however, say the conquest of Latin America by Catholic Spaniards and Portuguese lead to misery, enslavement and death.
'Sensitive historical episode'? To say the very least. Makes this faithful nonbeliever long for happier days of life with the peace-loving and grandfatherly John Paul II, the unofficially adored "Mexican Pope," who in 2002 canonized Juan Diego in ceremonies rich with indigenous icons and pageantry. It was pure symbolism, of course, but also a gesture that implicitly said the marraige of two parts to make a richer whole is far more desirable than the outright decimation of one for another. * Photo by AFP/Getty, via NYTimes.com.