"In sign of a stronger bond, Kerry visits Vatican" by Matt Viser | Globe Staff, January 15, 2014
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John Kerry, whose political career has at times put him publicly at odds with Catholic Church leadership, traveled on Tuesday to the Vatican in a visit that demonstrated a reinvigorated relationship between the world’s most powerful country and one of its most powerful institutions.
The meeting – which the former altar boy deemed “a thrill” – marks a new, deeper alignment between Washington and the Vatican. The United States and the church are more actively searching for common ground, a development that some observers say is the result of a more inclusive approach by Pope Francis.
That strange terminology freaks me out a little there, but….
It marked the first time in nearly nine years that a US secretary of state had visited the Vatican. The visit was all the more meaningful for Kerry, the first Catholic secretary of state since Edmund Muskie, who traveled to the Vatican in 1980 with President Jimmy Carter. It was also striking that Kerry, who 10 years ago was forbidden by some bishops from taking Communion because of his stance on abortion, found himself in private rooms at the Vatican.
“As an altar boy, as a young kid, I would never have imagined that I would have been crossing the threshold of the Vatican to meet, as secretary of state, with the secretary of state of the Holy See,” Kerry told reporters after his visit Tuesday.
Kerry, 70, did not meet with Pope Francis, because of sensitivities about the pope meeting Kerry without having first met President Obama….
The White House announced that Obama would meet with the pope in the “near future.”
Yeah, yeah, enough of the back-slapping and glad-handing happiness.
The relationship between the Vatican and Washington has typically been strong, although there have been points of friction, particularly with Democratic leaders on issues such as abortion, contraception, and gay marriage. Those divisions remain, but they have diminished since the elevation of Pope Francis, who has focused far more of his attention on issues of social justice that resonate particularly with the Obama administration….
Okay, I'm just going to stop there because that is such a load of crap.
Here we have a president, with all due respect to the office and idea, dropping drone missiles on people, who has his intelligence agencies fomenting covert coups when outright military action has failed, who has Libya all to himself (you forget about Libya, don't you, when it comes to the long list of countries AmeriKa is waging war on), as torture and indefinite detention continue to be official policy -- and he who has presided over an economic "recovery" over the last five years that has only concentrated more wealth within the top 1% (with the inequality $moke$creen again ari$ing ju$t in time for the campaign $ea$on).
The delicate and divisive social issues were not on the agenda during Kerry’s meeting on Tuesday, and the two parties mostly discussed ways to cooperate in the Middle East, particularly over Syria and in the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, both sides offered after the meeting. The pope is planning to visit the area in May….
Wow, how unlike my daily newspaper pushing all sorts of those issues.
NEXT DAY UPDATE: Kerry plays down spat with Israeli defense chief
Yeah, it's okay if Zionist scum shits in his face.
"Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior Palestinian official, complained that US proposals had largely sided with Israeli positions. He said Israel is demanding that it keep large blocs of West Bank settlements, maintain a presence in the West Bank’s Jordan Valley, and retain control of airspace, water resources, and telecommunications frequencies in the West Bank, and keep its control of East Jerusalem."
The Israeli position is the U.S. position, so Kerry must be naïve or disingenuous and complicit.
And the f***ing Zionist Jews***ts are still unhappy?
Time to go back to the U.N.
One reason that the Vatican and Washington are finding more common ground, according to several longtime Catholic observers, is that US foreign policy has put more of an emphasis on diplomacy to solve thorny problems.
If you say so, Globe. I really don't see it. They are trying to pick fights with China and Russia now.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan – opposed by the Catholic Church – are now fading.
(Blog editor's head dropped to his chest when he read that. They are fading only in the minds of agenda-pu$hing pukes over here in the ma$$ media and propaganda pre$$. I know I don't get to those regions and nations as much as I would like and am again getting behind, but when I read something like that…. sorry, $hit-shovelers, but those things have hardly faded for the people that live there and are in some cases getting worse thanks to "Al-CIA-Duh" in the region)
In their place, Kerry has promoted diplomacy in places like Syria and Iran….
(Oh, blog editor can't take it. Syria would have been turned to rubble right now had Kerry not misspoke and had Putin not seized on the stepping in shit to forestall U.S. bombing at the last minute. And while I appreciate the pullback on Iran they are still under tremendous pressure from the Zionist $tring-pullers that control what is known as the U.S. Congre$$)
Kerry’s faith has long been an important, if quiet, part of his identity….
See: Kohn Men
Yeah, that is kept real quiet.
What is even stranger is the Zionist are slapping him around these days.
Kerry arrived at Apostolic Palace on Tuesday in a steady rain. When the Vatican officials greeting him apologized for it, he quipped, “I thought you were supposed to take care of this.”
Wow, that guilty conscience about everything stereotype really takes hold of a person. Got the Vatican apologizing for rain now. I don't suppose Kerry's jet travels have helped with the greenhouse gas and global warming problem.
*****************
Kerry, addressing US Embassy staff in Italy, said, “Somebody teased me with a headline earlier today — say ‘Kerry Arrives; Pope Goes.’ I don’t know. But I’m not going near that one. “
That's what they are, and I'm not going near the rest of the piece, readers.
--more--"
I suppose the Pope wouldn't approve of the profane language here; however, I would like to believe he would approve of words and not violent actions.
Besides, I'm just about done here anyway. The commentary on the latest corporate swill is almost obsolete. Repeating myself over and over again really serves no purpose. The $y$tem is rotted from the in$ide now, it is beyond $aving (sorry -- pun intended -- to say), and AmeriKa is nothing more than a rank and fetid carcass hulking along to its self-destruction. I tired to prevent it and failed. I'm sorry, readers.
Also see:
You can decide for yourself whether you think Kerry goes up or down.
