Friday, June 22, 2007
Tony Blair
Tony Blair is planning to announce that he will convert to Roman Catholicism soon after he meets the Pope at the Vatican tomorrow, according to Church sources and friends of the British Prime Minister.
Blair's wife Cherie is a Roman Catholic, the couple's children have attended Catholic schools and Blair habitually attends Catholic rather than Anglican services. In 1996, a year before he became prime minister, he was admonished by the late Cardinal Basil Hume to stop receiving communion at Mass because he was not a Catholic.
IMO: On the face of it, that implies that Blair has considerable naivety - any fool knows he shouldn't have been taking communion in those circumstances, although you can argue that he is such a pukka sahib, normal church rules do not apply to the likes of him.
Friends say he studies both the Bible and the Koran daily, and much of his political philosophy has been influenced by the social teachings of the Church.
IMO: God help us all. But I suppose we might have guessed.
Others say: "But what is in it for him? The answer, I think, is terribly simple: Tony Blair no more believes in the Church of England than the Pope does. He has always wanted to sign up with the biggest and most powerful gang around, and Roman Catholicism is a big, serious, organised religion. Apparently, his chief of staff once told an ambassador to Washington to "get up the arse of the White House and stay there". One might hope Blair's relationship with the Pope will be rather different, but in the end I think it is true that something of the same impulses led him to Rome as led him to invade Iraq: he wants to be on the side of the angels - the biggest, baddest angels he can find."
Mr Blair is reported as asking his confidant Father Timothy Russ about a possible conversion: "Would this be possible?" He was told: "It usually takes two or three years", to which he replied: "The fact that I'm PM, could this make a difference?"
IMO: That sums it up.
Blair's wife Cherie is a Roman Catholic, the couple's children have attended Catholic schools and Blair habitually attends Catholic rather than Anglican services. In 1996, a year before he became prime minister, he was admonished by the late Cardinal Basil Hume to stop receiving communion at Mass because he was not a Catholic.
IMO: On the face of it, that implies that Blair has considerable naivety - any fool knows he shouldn't have been taking communion in those circumstances, although you can argue that he is such a pukka sahib, normal church rules do not apply to the likes of him.
Friends say he studies both the Bible and the Koran daily, and much of his political philosophy has been influenced by the social teachings of the Church.
IMO: God help us all. But I suppose we might have guessed.
Others say: "But what is in it for him? The answer, I think, is terribly simple: Tony Blair no more believes in the Church of England than the Pope does. He has always wanted to sign up with the biggest and most powerful gang around, and Roman Catholicism is a big, serious, organised religion. Apparently, his chief of staff once told an ambassador to Washington to "get up the arse of the White House and stay there". One might hope Blair's relationship with the Pope will be rather different, but in the end I think it is true that something of the same impulses led him to Rome as led him to invade Iraq: he wants to be on the side of the angels - the biggest, baddest angels he can find."
Mr Blair is reported as asking his confidant Father Timothy Russ about a possible conversion: "Would this be possible?" He was told: "It usually takes two or three years", to which he replied: "The fact that I'm PM, could this make a difference?"
IMO: That sums it up.
# posted by uv : 10:23 AM
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