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Topic: Maybe this bit of news can help explain the lunacy. (Read 589 times) |
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teh
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Maybe this bit of news can help explain the lunacy.
« on: 2007-06-22 10:07:30 » |
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[teh] I've often wondered why our prime minister behaves in the way he does. There are of course a plethora of reasons such as economic gains, party political inter and intra power struggles, international pressures to and by the UK, so on and so forth. The one issue that the majority within this lovely island of ours have forgotten (including myself), Religion!
[teh]Tony Blair has in the past displayed strong leanings to certain religious beliefs but was always carefull to limit those public displays of faith to the bounds of himself and his family. I had always thought of such declarations as political spin to entice those of religious leanings to cast their votes in his party's direction.
[teh]It seems I have been mistaken. With clear hindsight, this news from The Independent does not come as a surprise:
Blair will become a Catholic
By Andrew Grice, Political Editor
Published: 22 June 2007
Tony Blair is "certain" to become a Roman Catholic shortly after he steps down from office next week, friends of the Prime Minister have told The Independent. They believe it will happen "sooner rather than later".
Mr Blair is likely to discuss his conversion with Pope Benedict XVI, with whom he will hold talks in Rome tomorrow after attending his last summit of European Union leaders in Brussels.
Aides say that in the private one-to-one meeting, he will also discuss his plans to set up a Blair Inter-Faith Foundation aimed at fostering closer links between people from different religions.
There have been persistent rumours that the Prime Minister would convert to Catholicism but Downing Street has always insisted that he remains a member of the Church of England.
Now friends say Mr Blair will formalise his already close affiliation to the Catholic Church. They say his "spiritual guide" in making the decision has been his wife, Cherie. They have brought up their four children as Catholics.
Before he became Prime Minister, Mr Blair regularly took communion with his wife and children at a Catholic church in Islington, north London. He ceased doing so in public after an intervention by the late Cardinal Hume, when he was leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales.
It is believed that Mr Blair decided to remain an Anglican while he was Prime Minister because of the possible legal and political difficulties of converting while in office.
Although Britain has never had a Catholic prime minister, the church has said there would be no constitutional bar to Mr Blair joining while he was still in office. But some lawyers believe the 1829 Emancipation Act, which granted civil rights to Roman Catholics, may still prevent a Catholic from becoming Prime Minister. It says that no Catholic adviser to the monarch can hold civil or military office.
Some constitutional historians have said a conversion could affect the relationship between church and state. As Prime Minister, Mr Blair makes recommendations to the Queen on the appointment of Church of England bishops - a role that Gordon Brown intends to hand back to the church when he succeeds Mr Blair as part of a raft of constitutional reforms. Church officials say this is a state role rather than a religious one and that the Prime Minister's own affiliations need not be a difficulty.
If he had converted while Prime Minister, Mr Blair might have faced questions about whether his religious views had affected his decisions.
Friends dismissed speculation that Mr Blair would become a deacon, a lay role within the Catholic Church, which would have allowed him to preside over ceremonies including marriage but not communion.
Mr Blair has discussed his conversion with Canon Timothy Russ, the priest whose parish includes Chequers, the Prime Minister's country retreat in Buckinghamshire. The formal process of the switch are understood to be being handled by Father John Walsh, a regular visitor to Chequers. The family stopped going to church after the Iraq war for security reasons but attend private mass.
Father Russ, a critic of the Iraq war, said in a 2004 interview that Mr Blair had asked him: "Can the Prime Minister of Britain be a Catholic?" At the time, the Prime Minister, asked whether he planned to covert, replied: "I am saying no. Don't they run this once a year? I think they do."
Mr Blair is keen to be involved in four issues after he leaves office: inter-faith work to promote dialogue between Christianity, Islam and Judaism; a "serious job" in the Middle East, where the White House has said he may become an envoy; climate change; and Africa. He is expected to carry out speaking engagements.
Some MPs have cast doubts on Mr Blair's ability to act as a go-between for the world's religions because of the Iraq war. His possible Middle East role also raised eyebrows because he was accused of taking a pro-Israeli line during the crisis in Lebanon last summer. But one friend said: "He is keen to do the inter-faith work. That will be a big priority."
As Prime Minister Mr Blair has been cautious about his religious beliefs. As Alastair Campbell, his former director of communications, once famously said: "We don't do God."
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[teh] Of course my original hypothesis concerning Blair's religious statements may still hold true. This may all be spin and Tony is simply playing the game to the very end. In which case I applaud him for being such a deviant well learned player.
[teh] In either case, in that unmistakable British spirit of sportsmanship the man deserves applause.
[teh] Slow, timed, daunting applause.
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teh
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Re:Maybe this bit of news can help explain the lunacy.
« Reply #1 on: 2007-06-23 21:50:25 » |
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[teh] Well, for those interested in the UK Prime Ministers conversion to Catholicism, here's the update. It doesn't look like it's going to be easy sailing!
[teh] The Observer presents a vitriolic reproachfull meeting between the two, noting the specific language being used by the Vatican publicity mill.
Blair tells Pope: Now I'm ready to become a Catholic
John Hooper in Vatican City
Sunday June 24, 2007
Tony Blair yesterday used his last official foreign engagement before leaving office to tell Pope Benedict he wanted to become a Roman Catholic, a Vatican source said last night.
But, in talks lasting more than half an hour, the outgoing Prime Minister was left in no doubt that the Pope took a dim view of his record in office. A statement issued afterwards by the Vatican said there had been a 'frank exchange of views'.
This is highly unusual language for the Vatican, which habitually describes meetings between the pontiff and other heads of state and government as 'cordial'. 'Frank' is code for unstinting criticism.
Vatican sources said the Pope remained unmoved in his view that Blair had been wrong over Iraq. To an even greater extent than his predecessor, Benedict feels that Catholic politicians cannot separate their public lives from their private
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[teh] The Independent, a little more conservative in it's reporting, gives an account of a slightly atypical meeting between Blair and The Pope.
Blair gives Pope portrait of Catholic convert
By John Phillips in Rome
Published: 24 June 2007
Students of symbolism raised their eyebrows yesterday when it emerged that Tony Blair's gift to the Pope at the end of their meeting in Rome was a signed photograph of Cardinal Newman, Britain's most famous convert to Catholicism. The present will do nothing to dampen speculation about the Prime Minister's own potential conversion after he leaves office this week.
The Holy See's response, however, was to gently rap the Prime Minister on the knuckles in a statement about British legislation obliging Catholic adoption agencies to accept homosexual parents.
Pope Benedict welcomed Mr Blair and his wife Cherie in the library of his private apartment in the Apostolic Palace for a private audience. "Thank you so much for receiving me," Mr Blair, looking moved, said to the Pope.
The mood was relaxed, cordial and chatty as the Pope invited Mr Blair to be seated for a photo session before they held 25 minutes of private talks.
Watched by a pool of reporters from the Vatican press corps, Mr Blair presented the Pope with three original portrait photographs of Cardinal Newman. The leading light of the Oxford Movement is still an icon for English Catholics and was one of the nation's most illustrious converts.
One of the photographs was signed by Cardinal Newman. "Holy Father, that is his signature," Mrs Blair told the Pope.
The pontiff gave Mr Blair a gold medallion recording his pontificate, in a white presentation box.
After their private talks, Mr Blair and the Pope were joined by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, head of the Catholic Church in England, for a further 10 minutes of talks.
Mr Blair also had a meeting with the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, effectively the prime minister of the Pope's tiny city state.
After the audience the Blairs had lunch at the Venerable English College in Rome, the seminary for young English men training for the priesthood. It produced a number of martyrs who were executed in England during the Reformation.
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teh
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Re:Maybe this bit of news can help explain the lunacy.
« Reply #2 on: 2007-06-23 22:12:13 » |
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[teh] I nearly forgot to include this juicy article, also from The Independent.
PM's Iraq war 'helped drive Catholics out of Downing Street'
By Andrew Grice and Andy McSmith
Published: 23 June 2007
Tony Blair's hard line on Iraq alienated three Roman Catholics who worked for him in Downing Street. All three, who were experts in foreign affairs, were deeply worried by what they saw as the rush to war in 2003, The Independent has learnt.
The revelation comes as Mr Blair prepares for this morning's audience with Pope Benedict XVI, where he is expected to discuss his intention to convert to Roman Catholicism. He will also hear the Vatican's concerns about the Middle East.
Mr Blair once declared that God would be the judge of whether he was right to go war in Iraq - but has not previously shown any sign of allowing the Pope or any other religious figure to influence him, despite his deeply held Christian beliefs.
Insiders have disclosed that at least two practising Catholics on Mr Blair's Downing Street staff were prompted to leave because they shared the late Pope John Paul II's concerns over his Iraq policy.
They included Tim Livesey, who was seconded to the Downing Street press office in 1999 after 12 years in the Foreign Office. He left in January 2002, more than a year before the invasion, to become a public affairs adviser to Cardinal Cormac Murphy- O'Connor, the head of the Catholic Church in Britain. He is now public affairs secretary to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
The next to depart was Francis Campbell, who was also seconded to Downing Street from the Foreign Office in 1999, as a policy adviser and later as Mr Blair's private secretary. He left in 2003 to take up a post at the British embassy in Rome. He was appointed ambassador to the Holy See in December 2005.
The third was Sir Stephen Wall, the head of Mr Blair's European secretariat between 2000 and 2004, who followed Mr Livesey to take over as adviser to Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor.
The three joined forces in Downing Street with Fiona Millar, the partner of Alastair Campbell, to give vocal opposition to the war. Ms Millar, who is not a Catholic, worked for Cherie Blair, but left in September 2003.
The Middle East is expected to be high on the agenda during Mr Blair's audience with the Pope, scheduled for 11am this morning. Tony and Cherie Blair have also been invited to lunch with Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor at the Venerable English College in Rome. He will be the first serving Prime Minister to visit the college, founded in 1579 to train priests for England and Wales, where they faced persecution.
Tony Blair is one of the most devout Christians to occupy No 10, and there has been speculation for more than a decade that he would convert to Catholicism after he left office. There is no constitutional bar to a non-Anglican holding the office of Prime Minister, but no precedent either. Mrs Blair is a lifelong Catholic. The Blair children attended Catholic schools and Mr Blair frequently attended Mass. In 1996, he was told by Cardinal Basil Hume to stop receiving communion at Mass because he was not a Catholic. He is rumoured to have taken communion from the late Pope John Paul when he visited the Vatican in 2003, but this has never been confirmed. Interviewed by Michael Parkinson last year on how - as a Christian - he lived with the decision to go war in Iraq, Mr Blair replied: "If you have faith about these things then you realise that judgement is made by other people. If you believe in God, it's made by God as well."
His office refused to be drawn on whether he intends to convert. A spokesman repeated the official line that "he remains a member of the Church of England".
The 'journey of faith'
* If the Prime Minister has formed the intellectual conviction that the Roman Catholic Church is the true church, if he has the "good will to believe", and if he has been through the required preparation, the church is strictly bound by the gospel to accept him. But Mr Blair will be required to go through a "journey into faith" so complex that the official guidebook, entitled Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, covers 44 pages and over 400 clauses. The Church will demand deep "inner adherence" to it. He will have to receive "doctrinal and spiritual preparation" and go through a profession of faith, and confession. The handbook says: "If the profession of faith and reception take place within Mass, the candidate, according to his or her own conscience, should make a confession of sins beforehand, first informing the confessor that he or she is about to be received into full communion." It continues: "At the reception, the candidate should be accompanied by a sponsor and may even have two sponsors. If someone has had the principal part in guiding or preparing the candidate, he or she should be the sponsor." Mr Blair has had spiritual guidance from several people, including Fr John Walsh, an RAF chaplain. But if he has only one sponsor, it is expected to be his wife, Cherie, a lifelong Catholic.
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