Any Picks For The New Pope??

[Mrs. P]

For those who love graphics...here's a great NYT graphic showing the geographical shift in Catholic believers.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...over-the-past-century.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0

 

[skateluvr]

Habemas Papam evryone!

He is wonderful, from Argentina (i bet on Brazil but finally from the "New World" and latin America in particular. He is a bit old 76, has only one lung, so pray for this man and health.

He was runner up to Benedict in 2005 but begged not to be Pope. (Insider leaked info from a cardinal's diary that was never named-my source, Spiritdaily.com) He has refused to live like a prince of the church- takes the bus, refuses a limo, no palace and cooks for himself! A champion of the poor and all who know him are happy and inspired, some good news. Doris, I am sure he will agree with zero tolerance that Benedict clearly has enforced (god's rottweiler they used to say of ratzinger).

He cares very much for the poor, and he last lent washed the feet of Aids victims and kissed their feet. I'd do most anything to serve but would balk at that-any feet-washing yes, but kissing? No thank you LOL. I'm very impressed and he was not on the lists maybe because everyone thought the pope should be about 70 years old.

Yes, Dee, they could have picked a Bishop, but Cardinals are usually impressive gifted people, as any one could end up pope. He did not look as happy as Benedict did. Wow, what a toll they took on him. I think it will be good that the new pope can go to the old Pope and find out exactly who was involved in Vatileaks. This new pope comes from a land of dictators and has been through "stuff" so some old men who like to gossip in the Curia will be no big deal. He is a reformer and a an of the people. I am pleased, after reading. I am shocked I missed it, but it will be on news again and videos are all over the net. I did not expect it today, rather tomorrow.

Pray for him. He will be attacked by many people. We must stop holding every preist accountable for the sins of the sick pedophiles. My doicese laicized 3 preists this week who were pulled out decades ago. So some Bishops have always done the right thing.

 

[Olympia]

I just realized this morning: they did, after all, end up with an Italian pope! I think his parents came to Argentina from Italy. There are a lot of ethnic Europeans in Argentina and Chile. I doubt that affected their deliberations, but it's kind of a cute fact. My Spanish office-mate has heard from friends that he's already been called Papa Paco, a Spanish nickname for Francisco.

Now that he's in there, doing the job, of course I'll pray for him. As we saw from JP2, the Pope can do a great deal of good for the world.

 

[heyang]

http://news.yahoo.com/pope-francis-humility-stops-hotel-bags-112502058.html

Seems like he intends to continue as he was before as much as possible.

 

[heyang]

Here's another link where Cardinal Dolan describes part of the post election events. Based upon current reports, I am favorably impressed by Pope Francis.

http://news.yahoo.com/york-cardinal-offers-glimpse-popes-style-012855449.html

 

[Mrs. P]

I just realized this morning: they did, after all, end up with an Italian pope! I think his parents came to Argentina from Italy. There are a lot of ethnic Europeans in Argentina and Chile. I doubt that affected their deliberations, but it's kind of a cute fact. My Spanish office-mate has heard from friends that he's already been called Papa Paco, a Spanish nickname for Francisco.

Now that he's in there, doing the job, of course I'll pray for him. As we saw from JP2, the Pope can do a great deal of good for the world.

Yeah, there's been a lot of discussion among my Latino friends whether he's really a Latin American pope given that many Latin Americans consider Argentina to be more European.

 

[Dee4707]

I love the comment he made to his brother cardinals.....May God forgive you for what you have done!!! What a sense of humor. Also loved the photo of him carrying the little basket of flowers to place at the shrine of Blessed Mother.

 

[skateluvr]

oh, how sweet Dee!...I'll look for the photo from St Mary Major. Yes, he is Italian but born and raised in Argentina. The slums of Buenos Aires are very familiar to him...now onto the ladies lp finally...I so hope Osmond and our girls pulled up!

 

[Olympia]

Apparently he's still living in the Vatican hotel he stayed in for the conclave, though he's using the papal apartment offices for meetings and so forth. I've also read that, in addition to concentrating on the poor, he's written about taking care of nature. Gee, that would be a huge help out in the world! I'm feeling more and more impressed with him.

 

[louisa05]

Apparently he's still living in the Vatican hotel he stayed in for the conclave, though he's using the papal apartment offices for meetings and so forth. I've also read that, in addition to concentrating on the poor, he's written about taking care of nature. Gee, that would be a huge help out in the world! I'm feeling more and more impressed with him.

Yes. He apparently wishes to stay at that hotel which is more a hostel for visiting students, priests and bishops. He is taking most of his meals there in the cafeteria with the others and I read somewhere that he likes being in daily contact with regular clergy.

And the "traditionalist" Catholics who would like us to have Latin mass and women in the balcony or something are losing their minds over the Holy Thursday mass at a juvenile prison today. Particularly, he upset that faction of the church as he washed the feet of 1) young prisoners 2) two young women and 3) at least one Muslim. Papal tradition has been that the pope washes the feet of priests at a major basilica in Rome. How dare he go out to the people instead. After all, Jesus said "when I was in prison, you visited me" and by that he surely didn't mean a real visit to a real prison. Let alone women prisoners!! And as one of my traditionalist Catholic friends lamented on Facebook recently, all of this horrible stuff and he still hasn't talked about abortion yet. What is to become of us??

Turning off the sarcasm...Pope Francis is giving me hope that the Church can become relevant again for our broken world.

 

[Dee4707]

Here is an article about Pope Francis going to the prison.

http://news.yahoo.com/pope-urges-catholic-priests-help-poor-shun-careerism-112315330.html

I, too, am so far impressed with him.

 

[Olympia]

Yes. He apparently wishes to stay at that hotel which is more a hostel for visiting students, priests and bishops. He is taking most of his meals there in the cafeteria with the others and I read somewhere that he likes being in daily contact with regular clergy.

And the "traditionalist" Catholics who would like us to have Latin mass and women in the balcony or something are losing their minds over the Holy Thursday mass at a juvenile prison today. Particularly, he upset that faction of the church as he washed the feet of 1) young prisoners 2) two young women and 3) at least one Muslim. Papal tradition has been that the pope washes the feet of priests at a major basilica in Rome. How dare he go out to the people instead. After all, Jesus said "when I was in prison, you visited me" and by that he surely didn't mean a real visit to a real prison. Let alone women prisoners!! And as one of my traditionalist Catholic friends lamented on Facebook recently, all of this horrible stuff and he still hasn't talked about abortion yet. What is to become of us??

Turning off the sarcasm...Pope Francis is giving me hope that the Church can become relevant again for our broken world.

Oh, my Lord, yes. This is to me the whole point of the Church, or any house of worship. If this guy looks at everyone and sees a brother or a sister, we have the Real Thing on our hands. Didn't he kiss their feet as well today?

Do you know that Leonard Cohen song "Suzanne"? There's a lovely line in it about how at one point Jesus realizes that "only drowning men can see him." I've often seen Him clearest when I'm going down for the third time, myself. (Of course, I've often seen Him clearest when everything is almost too wonderful to be believed, also. But that's another story.) It seems to me that a man unwilling to make the dive into the deepest part of the ocean, where the drowning folk are sinking, won't be of much help.

 

[skateluvr]

Olympia, I used to play Suzanne back when I poorly played guitar. I had a nice singing voice (college musicals) Suzanne as sung by Judy Collins was my favorite version. The words of the song are inspired. To hear you quote this song makes me feel (along with many posts) you are a kindred spirit.

I have a question for you since you have been able to find time in your life to educate yourself re classical music. Much has been said about carmen. Our small theatre but professional, is having 'Carmen the Musical.' I am the only person I think who doesn't mind hearing the sections usually used for figure skating. Without my mother's income, I am more afraid of spending for entertainment but need it more. There is a ballet coming, and tho one seat to anything is sad, it is a russian trouple doing a classic-maybe Sleeping Beauty. I need to look it up since I lost the flyer. I have always been stirred by carmen and it is uplifting. Has anyone seen this musical called "Carmen the Musical?" I can youtube it to see what orchestras do all of the music. I am wondering if it would be like the skating Carmen on Ice-was that the whole opera? I am thinking if I get a groupon ticket, Carmen is 20.00. That's affordable. I sometimes get bored by clasical ballet warhorses, only because I saw a lot of ballet back in the day, and I grew to love more avant-garde peices by Balanchine- Classically trained ballerinas but with brilliant choreography.

I am wondering what "Carmen the Musical" would be like. Would carmen on Ice represent all of Bizet's Carmen? I can't do both, but feel the need to experience some beauty in an ugly world. Any links to what i would likely see. It turns out the local chorus, not the theatre is doing it, so it is not like a touring company. Warhorse concert or warhorse ballet? What do you big city dwellers who see all the stuff like heyang, Olympia, etc think? Sometimes music hits me in ways I do not expect, and I am still deeply mourning my mother. I guess I wonder which will be most uplifting. I had planned to take her to Les Mis when it came, since I loved it when we saw it in Providence and I was not uplifted at all by the movie. But it didn't happen and I have no culture vulture friend or date. I spent a lot of time with my mother, afraid of the day.... I was disabled young, and all you lucky married women here...I was a religious but had to leave that. It is not for the sick. How I wish I had a husband to see skating, etc. I am very jealous to hear the stories here. How blessed to have that someone.

 

[Olympia]

I don't get out much myself. That's what YouTube is for. A universe at your beck and call.

I'm not familiar with a musical of Carmen. (That is, except for the old musical Carmen Jones, which I doubt this is.) What I know about the opera of Carmen is that it has singularly sublime music and singularly unpleasant characters. Carmen herself is completely amoral, though of course she sings like a dream, and she ensnares poor Don Jose and leads him to his doom. I doubt I'm giving away a spoiler at this point by saying that things don't end so well for Carmen either. This kind of plot lends itself better to a ballet or a skating production, where you can ignore the baser details of the characters for the beauty of the musical interpretation.

So if you're looking for lovely music, this is a good choice, but if you're looking for uplift, I'm not so sure. Of course, I don't know which parts of the opera made it into the musical. The Witt-Boitano-Orser ice production pretty much captured the essence of the opera, though it was not quite as intense. Short of having Carmen redeemed as Marguerite is in Faust, there's really no way to pretty up this plot.

The idea of looking for something musical to help your emotions is a good one, though. There's sure to be something else around if you give things a look.

 

[skateluvr]

Thanks Olympia. I was too late for both. PCA mayhem. I don't understand. God must send help as I'm failing. Just saw Smash. I thought t was gone from TV. Turns out it is on Sat night. Talk about killing a good TV show. Well atleast I can watch the past ones on line I think. I am in a chaoltic world. I have a sick cat at my mothers hous and I just cant ut her down. She was supposed to die first. My dear preist friend in hosp with Pneumonia and a pacemaker implant. Ican't do much on my own at mum's house. The executor my brother is in hawaii. If only she had sold it. Well, we have one pro theatre but if u can't plan ahead even one ticket is tough. Idecided I wanted to seeSwan Lake as it was a russian troupe. Everyseat left up stairs and obstructed view. So disappointing. I did rewatch Carmen on Ice. It was pretty good. When Katt was the star-she had such a career. Talk about a face that loved the camera. I miss her and roz Summers --both great as pros I thought-and stunning. Truly-ice princesses. With the lockdown in Boston, much suffered. The difference in prices in the same touring shows are huge. My town cheaper than Boston-just smaller venue.

Well, Swan Lake got awesome reviews. Russians after all. I'm so tired. I will ignore what I have to do and look for Smash episodes. I hope that it gets renewed but Sat night is kiss of death I think. Not fair! I pay for cable and hardly watch the damn TV!