#22300: — 04/19  at  02:26 PM
Since zombies have no will of their own, I don't think they would make good popes. No, wait, maybe that's exactly what the college of cardinals wants. And he's old. Maybe he died and they reanimated him. You might just be onto something.

#22302: — 04/19  at  02:34 PM
As others have noted, his ties to the Nazi party are pretty weak. About all
you can say is that he showed about the level of moral leadership you might
expect from a typical teenage kid. That's not a ringing endorsement, but
then, I wasn't raised to view Popes as moral exemplars.

HIs characterization of liberals as "fascists" is bit more to the point. I also
found his choice of name to be interesting frightening.
Majikthese has more on that.

#22303: The Commissar — 04/19  at  02:40 PM
ADL Welcomes Election of Cardinal Ratzinger as New Pope

New York, NY, April 19, 2005 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today welcomed the election of German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as the new Pope, Benedict XVI. Under his leadership in Germany and Rome, the Catholic Church made important strides in improving Catholic-Jewish relations and atoning for the sin of anti-Semitism. Cardinal Ratzinger has been a leader in this effort and has made important statements in the spirit of sensitivity and reconciliation with the Jewish people.

http://www.adl.org/PresRele/VaticanJewish_96/44698_96.htm

#22304: — 04/19  at  02:50 PM
Beware of Swiss bearing halberds!

Just wanted to respond to this:

The importance of the Pope, and who he/she is, is vastly overrated in my opinion. I'm not a Catholic but I've worked for and with Catholics all my life, including quite a few ex-priests and ex-nuns, and few look to the Pope or the hierarchy for moral or ethical guidance. With no state to rule—unless one wishes to maintain that the 200 or so acres of the Vatican is a real state—the church is devoid of temporal power and with having ceded its long claimed moral power in recent years, why pay it any more heed than a fourth world potentate?

While the point may be valid when it comes to most of North America (I really can't tell), I would say there are more than a few good reasons why those of us in the rest of the world are paying attention.

#1 obviously would be AIDS. While the Church' position on other forms of birth control may be annoying, only their opposition to condoms is partially responsible for a global pandemic.
#2 there's the relationship with other religious groups, both Christian and otherwise, as mentioned above. I'm not personally very interested in that issue, but could imagine that his branding other Christian groups "deficient" or applying pressure to asian ministers who speculated that maybe other religions served some purpose in Gods plan didn't go down well everywhere. And it could have a destabilising influence around the world, eg. in the Philippines.
#3 the Vatican puts a tremendous effort into lobbying the EU. With the admission of strongly catholic countries in the recent years, its voice has grown stronger.
#4etc. Supporting Opus Dei, fighting abortion, homosexuality, gender equality, South American liberation theology, etc. etc.

---

While some of the above posters are probably right that it'll drive off at least some moderate catholics in the Europe and US, one could speculate that that is precisely the idea. It's not here that the Church has hopes for it's future, but in Asia, South America and esp. Africa. Losing some of the excess fat in our parts of the world may make it easier to focus on the new markets.

#22305: — 04/19  at  02:52 PM
PZ has ample precedence for using "Pope Ratzinger". Italians often referred to JP II as "Papa Wojtyla".

As for the name Benedict, Benedict XV (della Chiesa) was a fairly nice guy who couldn't get a lot done because the pope didn't carry enough clout in those days to bring the combatants in World War I to the peace table. On the other hand, Benedict IX was the ultimate party pope. His papal reign was broken up into three separate pieces because he variously fled from an outraged populace for a time or sold the papacy to his uncle because he got bored with it. Ratzinger has a lot of range in his Benedictine namesakes.

#22306: fwiffo — 04/19  at  02:53 PM
Whether or not one can be both zombie and vampire may well depend upon the order in which one obtains those particular afflictions. Becoming a zombie requires that one first dies, then are raised, at which point you are free to show off your mortal wounds to your buddies and doubting Thomases and/or eat brains. However, being undead, vampires cannot die. They can be destoryed by a couple of different methods, which probably leave them in a state unsuitable for zombification. There is no prerequesite, to my knowledge, that would prevent a vampire from turning a zombie that they happend upon (in the general case).

Hypothetically, a zombie, vampire or vampire-zombie could also be a werewolf. A zombie certainly persists in spite of any human disease they may suffer, fatal or no, and I see no reason why lycanthropy should be any different. Vampires are presumably immune to the fatal effects of disease, but could they perhaps catch a cold? The flu? Lupis?

Personally, I vote for lich.

#22307: — 04/19  at  02:58 PM
PZ: I wasn't thinking a zombie. I was thinking more like a hobbit who gets all crazy-eyed when he sees the ring.

#22309: Craig — 04/19  at  03:05 PM
If I were eleted, I'd choose the name Jeff.
There needs to be a Pope Jeff.

#22310: — 04/19  at  03:11 PM
Regarding the growth of the catholic church in S America and Africa, if they truly hope for it, they might regret it later if their hopes are realized. There appears to be a strong tendency for the church in those regions to assume certain aspects of the local culture. That was OK for the church when the local culture was fairly local to Rome, but it might not go down so well with European catholics, much less Roman catholics, if the local culture is African or native S American. The catholic church doesn't have a very good record of suppressing local beliefs, even when they killed the locals to try to suppress those beliefs.

#22311: — 04/19  at  03:12 PM
The links between him and Nazism are weak as others have noted. He joined the Hitler Youth because he was required to do so. He was drafted into the army. He also deserted the German army. And do recall what generally happened to people who deserted the German army: they were summarily killed if caught. Indeed near the end of the war any male of appropriate age that was found not fighting was killed.

Folks, anyone who is going to fault an old man for what he was required to do as a child by the Nazis, who did nasty things when they got a "no", is simply being unreasonable.

I doubt think it is surprising that a theologically conservative pope was choosen given that John Paul II was himself theologically conservative and picked virtually all the cardinals.

So any thoughts on the next pope will be? The cardinals clearly picked a very old man to be pope. And probably by design to have one that spends only a few years before a new one is picked.

--
Anti-spam: Replace "user" with "harlequin2"

#22312: — 04/19  at  03:12 PM
"Save me, Jeebus!"

#22314: Craig — 04/19  at  03:13 PM
um, and if I were eleCted, too.

#22315: — 04/19  at  03:14 PM
Compare these two photos and then tell me that they aren't twins.

#22316: PZ Myers — 04/19  at  03:15 PM
I think this pope should have named himself "Pope Dracula". That would be even cooler than "Pope Jeff".

#22317: — 04/19  at  03:20 PM
Oops, sorry. Didn't know your system automatically puts up image tags. I'll try this:

Pope

Hobbit

#22318: — 04/19  at  03:22 PM
All right, they are really being stubborn about not viewing their images at all without going to their site, so last try:

Hobbit

Twins I tell you.

#22320: Craig — 04/19  at  03:24 PM
OK, yeah... Pope Dracula would be cool.
Besides, "Pope Jeff" sounds like a Pauly Shore movie or something.

#22322: Covington — 04/19  at  03:38 PM
Am I really reading, over and over and over on this thread "it's unfair to associate him with Nazis just because he was a Hitler Youth and fought in the army by running an anti-aircraft emplacement... he was just following orders"?

Among us (cultural) catholics, Ratzinger is well known, and has been for 20 years. We now have as pope the most radical right-winger among the cardinals, bar none. There is no competition at all.

It's almost like the cardinals elected him with the specific intent of destroying the church. God bless them for it.

#22323: PZ Myers — 04/19  at  03:39 PM
I took your links and moved them up top. You've convinced me. Keep that pope away from the ring!

#22324: — 04/19  at  03:52 PM
I think something that is being understated on the internet, where people are picking on the Hitler Youth thing, is the fact that this guy was hushing people during the whole Catholic Pedophilia scandal. He supposedly wrote a memo reminding people that it was against the rules to talk publicly. So, at least my opinion, protecting pedophiles is a much more news-worthy topic than is being part of some mandatory nazi organization at age 14.

#22325: — 04/19  at  03:54 PM
zombie schmombie, he much more resembles Emperor Palpatine.

#22326: Covington — 04/19  at  04:01 PM
Guess who it was who made the decision to return Cardinal Law to prominence and prestige?

#22327: Craig — 04/19  at  04:01 PM
Hey... if this guy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bawden
can be elected pope by his mom and six others in a storefront in Kansas, then I can be Pope Jeff if a few of you agree.

#22328: — 04/19  at  04:03 PM
Obviously 14-year-olds can not be held to the same moral standards as adults.

The previous pope was very telegenic, and aggressive. Ratzinger is very untelegenic. If he is a hard-liner, that will--no, may--serve to alienate americans from the church. The international child molesting conspiracy didn't alienate them, after all. on the bad side, christianity is becoming primarily a 3rd-world phenomenon, and those places often have foul and unwestern cultures rife with things like wife-beating, daughter-selling, honor-killing, vigilanteism, anti-intellectualism, etc, and could shape christianity into a much more illiberal thing.

#22329: — 04/19  at  04:42 PM
zombie schmombie, he much more resembles Emperor Palpatine.

Actually I thought he bears a closer resemblance to this madman: