PUNDIT WATCH
Douglas, Susan
PUNDIT WATCH Susan Douglas Paean to the Papacy His appearances generate an electricity unmatched by anyone else on Earth," gushed Time. He is "a superstar in almost perpetual motion," a man...
...He opposes the ordination of women...
...In June 1990, he asserted that Catholic theologians have no right to dissent publicly from official church teachings...
...And it even leads some lunatics to shoot them or the doctors who would help them control their reproductive lives...
...This is a bit much...
...Say amen, somebody.* Susan Douglas, a writer in Massachusetts and the author most recently of "Where the Girls Are," appears in this space every month...
...There are, of course, some more modern things about the Pope...
...Fortunately, evidence suggests that even in the nation of Brazil, with the world's largest Catholic population, most people ignore the pronouncements on birth control of the "Man of the Year...
...At the U.N...
...Mick Jagger...
...The reasons he was chosen...
...Time acknowledges that "in public-relations terms, it was a costly victory...
...But I do find it amazing that this man—who made headlines just a few months ago in Cairo by cynically becoming new best friends with Islamic militants so they could, together, thwart efforts to stem overpopulation—is now lionized as "a moral compass for believers and non-believers alike...
...At a time when public and private morality seems "adrift," "John Paul knows where he stands...
...Maybe my reaction to this choice of a man who insists that women are nothing more than baby factories is a bit strong, given that I was raised Catholic and am, like most lapsed Catholics, something of an authority on the church's legendary intolerance and hypocrisy, on the huge gap between many of the teachings of Christ and the church's inhumane doctrines...
...The "Man of the Year" story does not ignore these reactionary positions but, by emphasizing his jet-setting papal style, his multilingual skills, and his visits to the poor in Africa, seems to say, "Picky, picky, picky...
...That Time could celebrate a man whose entire belief system rests on the ongoing subjugation of women and the impoverishment of peoples around the planet is just one more sign of mainstream media blindness when it comes to the female half of the population...
...He is "a superstar in almost perpetual motion," a man loaded with "charisma," who prompted this "dazed reaction of a young woman" cheering wildly with others in a sports arena: "What is it that he has...
...He denies priests the permission to marry...
...Here's a deeply intolerant autocrat who, if he were, say, a prominent Muslim cleric, would be denounced in the very same pages of Time...
...Let's just take the thing on its own terms, and consider what Time is saying to every woman in the world—and to every child who goes to bed at night hungry, sick, filthy, or mistreated—by choosing this guy as the most exemplary, morally righteous human on the planet...
...Conference on Population and Development, the Vatican issued a personal attack against U.S...
...Just a few days ago, we had a "deeply religious" man make headlines in my state, a man who also knows exactly where he stands...
...He's the "conscience of the whole Christian world...
...Morality becomes hypocrisy if it means accepting mothers' suffering or dying in connection with unwanted pregnancies and illegal abortions and unwanted children...
...Vice President Al Gore and denounced proposed language that urged governments to regard unsafe abortions as a major public-health problem for women...
...Yet the Vatican succeeded in gutting Paragraph 8.25, which described safe, legal, and voluntary abortion as "a fundamental right of all women...
...He opposes all forms of birth control except abstinence...
...And in 1993, sounding a lot like Pat Robertson, he urged U.S...
...visit in 1993...
...He embodies moral "rectitude...
...Here are some of the virtues of the "Man of the Year...
...Participating countries were so disgusted with Vatican tactics that its delegates were booed...
...Nelson Mandela...
...In 1991, the Pope called for a new wave of conversion activity among Catholics, singling out Islamic countries as prime targets and insisting on the revocation of their laws forbidding proselytizing...
...bishops to combat "bitter, ideological feminism" among Catholic women which, he suggested, led to "nature worship" (read: witchcraft...
...He opposes the use of condoms under any circumstances...
...The church did retain the firm Famous Artists Merchandising Exchange to handle the marketing of popemobilia during his U.S...
...Nope, it's the Pope, Time's "Man of the Year...
...Now let's put aside, for a minute, a debunking of the entire "Man of the Year" concept, with its repulsive celebration of narcissistic individualism and pecking-order, missionary-position patriarchy...
...His views on abortion are, of course, common knowledge...
...He walked into two abortion clinics and killed two women, aged twenty-five and thirty-eight, and wounded five other people...
...And let's not forget this bright spot: More than 350 years after the church condemned Galileo for asserting that the Earth revolves around the Sun, forced him to recant his discoveries, and put him under house arrest for eight years until he died, John Paul decided to reverse the church's position...
...But it is also true that the Pope's brand of "consistency," his dogmatic, inflexible, and deeply sexist assertions of what is right and wrong inform the kind of religious extremism that oppresses millions of women around the globe...
...If we're going to remember anything about the conference in Cairo, let's recall the stirring words of Gro Harlem Brundt-land, prime minister of Norway, a woman who dared to take on the Vatican...
...It protested mention of any form of birth control except, presumably, the tried-and-true rhythm method...
...Prince...
...Let's even ignore the preposterous conflation of the realms of entertainment and religion in this overblown paean to the papacy...
...He is "consistent," praises Time...
...So what if people's lives are at stake...
...But what about the human terms...
...What about the everyday lives of real women and children...
...He denounces homosexuality...
...Certainly the Pope would denounce these murders...
Vol. 59 • February 1995 • No. 2
