Pope Is Ready to Die, His Former Aide Says

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=721&e=1&u=/nm/20050401/wl_nm/pope_acceptance_dc&sid=84439559

I think this would not be considered a duplicate. It contains this information, which I think is new:

"DUBLIN (Reuters) - Pope John Paul signaled he is ready to die by choosing not to return to hospital, his former private secretary said on Friday.

"The fact that he has not gone back to hospital is (shows) that he is serenely carrying the cross and ready to give up and to say 'It is finished'," said John Magee, Bishop of Cloyne in Ireland, who worked for the Pope for nine years and was with him during an assassination attempt in 1981."

I am sorry about his ill health, but I think it is worth noting now before it goes down the "memory hole" that this man is choosing not to subject himself to the same limbo he is willing to recommend others, like Terry Schiavo.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

as it should be. Keep government away from my body.

He is choosing how and where. No doubt, he has expressed how this is to go at the end.

But why couldn't he let Terri die the way she wanted to? :shrug:

???

The Vatican has a clearly established procedure for verifying the death of a pope.

Following is what is specified by Vatican law, according to Rev Thomas Reese, editor in chief of America, the Catholic weekly magazine, and author of Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organisation of the Catholic Church:.

When the Pope dies, the prefect of the papal household, Bishop James Harvey, informs the "camerlengo" or chamberlain, Cardinal Eduardo Martinez Somalo, who must verify his death.

He must do this in the presence of the papal master of ceremonies, Archbishop Piero Marini, the cleric prelates of the Apostolic Camera and the secretary of the Apostolic Camera.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Vatican-procedure-to-verify-pontiffs-demise/2005/04/01/1112302237815.html

HIS predecessor was not allowed any autopsy - after a pontifical reign of only 30 days.....

I have a book about his death somewhere. I seem to remember something about the Vatican Bank.

I also think when the Pope dies his ring is smashed and the doors are sealed. There are many ritual surrounding this, as I'm sure there are when any head of state dies.

personal papers,documents, bank details, medical notes etc and hope the CIA/MI6/Mossad and FSV are doing likewise.....

We must not let him decide.

we know what he reaLLy wants.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

that means i'm famous enough to be known.

i can onLy hope my death is cLoseLy watched, scrutinized, worshiped, protested, and interfered with.

and don't forget my famiLy - pLease intrude in their Lives, use them for props, and threaten them.

Send Delay over to Rome and have him issue an edict on the steps of the Vatican. "Put all the cardinals on notice and impeach any of them who dare allow the Pope to die!"
Where are the clowns? Send in the clowns...

...I think it is worth noting...that this man is choosing not to subject himself to the same limbo he is willing to recommend others, like Terry Schiavo.

The Pope is CHOOSING not to go the hosptial? That means he's choosing to die! That means he's not fighting for his life! That means he's passing up the opportunity to be kept alive artificially! THAT MEANS HE'S EMBRACING A CULTURE OF DEATH! Call the Florida state police! Tell President Mightymouse that he'll have to interrupt his vacation again! Tell those freeper Jesus freaks who were in front of Terri's hospice to get on the next plane to Vactican City!!!!

rocknation
:wow:

and I posted something just like you did. No profanity, no dissing the Pope, just that Bush should intervene, but it got deleted. Be careful - peeps like their popes...

hospital in the vatican.

"I think it is worth noting now before it goes down the "memory hole" that this man is choosing not to subject himself to the same limbo he is willing to recommend others, like Terry Schiavo"

No, not exactly. Without trying to defend his position, he is continuing to choose to be fed, understanding that this will extend his suffering. He apparently is choosing to not seek additional medical care, which he basically has always said one need not do. Effectively he is "placing himself in God's hands". Personally I find it a bit of hair splitting, but he hasn't asked of anyone else anything he isn't doing himself.

The same people who want to choose your sex partner for you, choose your reproductive life for you, choose your lifestyle for you, choose your end of life matters for you... ALWAYS make sure that THEY have choice over THEIR bodies.

Choice for ALL, or choice for NONE.

the church wants YOU to choose.

the church is making every effort to incorporate ITS choices for OUR lives into legislation at every level. In many areas, it is succeeding beyond its wildest dreams, especially in the current climate.

Technically speaking.:7

BTW, welcome to DU! :hi:

...to meet his maker.

But I think he's gonna get an earful from God on some things he did, such as:

1) The whole birth control business
2) The telling people not to use condoms while HIV was running rampant in Africa.
3) His reaction to the abuse scandal.

I'd like to think he made his choices without malice in those, but that is not up to me to decide in the end.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

Johnny Cochran, Terri Shiavo, Pope

interviewed on London radio this afternoon quoted odds that his firm are giving to the public regarding the exact date of the Pope's demise.

These are currently 6/4 for tomorrow and 5/4 for Sunday.

Additional odds were broadcast on the likely date of demise of other ailing luminaries such as Prince Rainer of Monaco and General Pinochet.

These were quoted in response to punters placing wagers in the UK and hoping to win money by guessing who dies when.

Suggests Pope may have died

He said in his living will that he wanted life support...

So I guess he's above the reinsertion crowd.

Religion is the opium of the masses...seems more like heroin to me.

But it was not.

"Religion is the opium of the masses"--how original!

I wish I could take credit but I can't, it's Karl Marx.

Give the rest of the quote, it sorta distorts Marx's attitude toward religion when you cut up the statement and present it selectively, don't you think?

I didn't know that was the full quote. Thanks :)

heart of the heartless world, hmmm, do you think that he is referring to the concept that it's the center of the heartless world (religion just being the false tool by which people use to their own endeavor) or does the world have religion at it's heart, but the rest of the world is heartless? (full of good intentions but poorly executed)

He certainly did not approve of religion, but he did see it as something that alleviated suffering. When he said "opiate" it was not as negative as that means to us with a society saturated in anti-drug hysteria, an opiate then would have been more like a miracle drug. However, Marx saw that an opiate didn't cure the condition, it just palliated the pain. Marx believed that after the revolution when social justice was acheived, religious myth would no longer be necessary. Here's fairly full context:

"Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d'honneur, it enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions.

The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun. Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself."

To paraphrase, fundamentalism is the opium of the people. (opium being used as a detrimental drug as opposed to Marx's original concept).

Or to extrapolate, it is indeed the opium of the masses, however, just like anything, even a good thing in excess becomes bad.

Thank you so much for the info. :)

No way they're going to let him die in April Fools.

At least his grave will say 04/02/05. Plus he doesn't have to ruin my 28th anniversary of moving to FL. At the time, my parents didn't think it was very funny. Oh well, 28 years later and I'm still here.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

I guess I might as well throw in the towel,huh?