{"id":2077,"date":"2013-02-11T16:41:00","date_gmt":"2013-02-11T16:41:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2013\/02\/the-catholic-billy-graham.html"},"modified":"2013-02-11T16:41:00","modified_gmt":"2013-02-11T16:41:00","slug":"the-catholic-billy-graham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2013\/02\/the-catholic-billy-graham.html","title":{"rendered":"The Catholic Billy Graham"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Amazing the similarities, and between the two in the picture,too<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Billy Graham has been called the Protestant Pope. \u00a0Well, there is some truth to that. \u00a0No Protestant or Evangelical worth his or her salt would say Graham was anything but a humble sinner. \u00a0We\u2019re all sinners after all. Called to minister to the sick not healthy. \u00a0In fact, if you sat in a Protestant church c. 1990s and said you thought Graham was perfect, if you were a pastor, you\u2019d be looking for a new church to serve.<\/p>\n

And yet, if you were to in any way critique or suggest somehow that Graham had failed in any way\u2026BAM! \u00a0You\u2019d get your rectum chewed out and chewed out in quick order. \u00a0Even if you quoted Graham himself in one of his later appraisals of his own early ministry strategies in order to make a broader point, you could expect to be pinned against the wall of the church foyer for an hour fighting for your life. \u00a0Sort of sounds like I speak from experience, don\u2019t it.<\/p>\n

Now, Pope Benedict XVI resigned today. \u00a0Caught everyone off guard. \u00a0When that happens, expect<\/a>\u00a0crappy <\/a>reporting<\/a>\u00a0from the News Media<\/a> since they haven\u2019t had time to work on the 24 hour news cycle worth of prepackaged stories. \u00a0What you\u2019ll get is a mad dash to find anyone who has even heard there\u2019s a Pope, and have them rush in and give their two cents. \u00a0So what you\u2019ll see is everyone finding someone to say what they hope fits with what they already\u00a0believe about Pope Benedict specifically, and Catholicism in general. \u00a0For the more\u00a0conservative\u00a0side: perhaps a good guy overall but flawed; For the liberal side: a fellow besieged by scandal, making way for the possibly\u00a0ascension\u00a0of a liberal progressive.<\/p>\n

Now, what will happen on the Catholic side will be three probable responses. \u00a0One will come with those who align themselves to various extra-church ideologies, and will judge Benedict according to those ideologies (OK, but wrong on Iraq\/fine but needed to get hip with the gay marriage times). \u00a0The second group will be those who take a long, honest look at things to the best of their ability. Don\u2019t expect to hear much from them. \u00a0They\u2019ll be busy doing their homework, far too busy to be interviewed or rush to comb their hair for the cameras.<\/p>\n

And then you\u2019ll have that third group, the group I was thinking of when I typed the post title. \u00a0They\u2019re the ones who seem to relish the Internet world of strange and obscure language that is non-committal and yet definite in its purpose. \u00a0I posted on one\u00a0manifestation\u00a0of this a while back<\/a>. \u00a0They will be the last \u2013 and I mean last \u2013 to say the Pope is perfect, flawless, always right, whatever. \u00a0They may have pointed out things that they thought he was less than stellar over the last few years. \u00a0And yet, well, you can see where it\u2019s going. \u00a0Do so much as suggest, even for the slightest minute, that Benedict might not actually deserve to become honorary fourth member of the Holy Trinity and\u2026BAM! \u00a0Get some extra underwear out of the closet.<\/p>\n

So I\u2019m going to sit back, watch the latest season of The Walking Dead <\/i>(don\u2019t even ask \u2013 I\u2019ve never even liked zombie movies), and wait for\u00a0things\u00a0to settle. \u00a0Then the folks with something to say will probably come out and suggest what is most likely true: a good man in a difficult time in the Church\u2019s life, a brilliant theologian with weaknesses, perhaps in administration, who did the best he could and helped the Church in many ways, while struggling with other endeavors. \u00a0Or something like it. \u00a0We\u2019ll see. \u00a0But as for me and my house, we\u2019ll also wait.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amazing the similarities, and between the two in the picture,too Billy Graham has been called the Protestant Pope. \u00a0Well, there is some truth to that. \u00a0No Protestant or Evangelical worth his or her salt would say Graham was anything but a humble sinner. \u00a0We\u2019re all sinners after all. Called to minister to the sick not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2805,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Catholic Billy Graham<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Amazing the similarities, and between the two in the picture,tooBilly Graham has been called the Protestant Pope.  Well, there is some truth to\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2013\/02\/the-catholic-billy-graham.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The 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