Papal Retreat

[jackofallgeeks]

I think that This Article, criticizing the pope for 'backing down', has a valid point in that the pope did miss what could have been a great opportunity to reach out to the Muslims and say something like, "yes, yours is a religion against violence, but look at what people are doing in her name. We must work together to end this and restore Islam's good name." After all, the Muslims were a great intellectual, philosophical people who preserved the works of the Greeks after the fall of Rome while the Europeans wallowed in barbarism and plague during the middle ages. But I think that's it's pretty plainly fact that horrible acts of violence are committed in the name of Islam these days, and the religion doesn't nearly have the esteem nor the respectability that the good part of it's history would deserve.

That being said, though, I don't think the pope was wrong to 'back down,' because I don't really think he *did* back down. He simply didn't say what people said he said, and that's as far as he took it. He missed the opportunity, yes, but not out of cowardice or humiliation, I think.