I took a bit of

I took a bit of time off from online stuff, basically because work has been more hectic lately, but I'm back now! As usual, I'm full of opinions about current happenings in the news. Such as this story.....

Vatican Official: Gays Unsuitable For Priesthood
This was an article in the Hartford Courant today. People who know me know where I'm at on this issue. There should be ZERO TOLERANCE for indiscretions from priests where children are concerned. This entire issue has nothing whatsoever to do with the sexual orientation of the priest. It has everything to do with the power the priest has over those he works with. In these instances, he is abusing that power and trust. The Catholic Church would like you to believe that this is a "gay issue" and the way to solve it is to just exclude and kick out gay priests. That's nothing but a smoke screen. What they need to do is to start being accountable for their own actions. If a priest is accused of abusing a child, and there is evidence to support that, the entire issue should be out of the hands of the Catholic Church. It should not even be an option that it go unreported. A crime has been committed and it's not up to some cardinal to decide if it is "appropriate" to tell the authorities. The only thing the church should have the authority to decide is if they want a convicted felon serving in their church. Every person is different. Would I hire a convicted felon? It would depend on the crime and what has been done for his/her rehabilitation. I treat people with compassion and I do think that very good people do some very bad things. We learn from our mistakes and go on with life. The Catholic Church needs to deal with this issue head on and stop trying to scapegoat any one group of people by saying it's their fault. Only then will they gain forgiveness from people and regain some credibility.

On the Iraq situation....
Am I the only one who is worried where all of this is going? It seems to me that President Bush is hell bent on going to war with Iraq if we find weapons of mass destruction or not. Maybe I'm missing something here. I'm not saying at all that Iraq is an innocent lamb. But what if the inspectors come up empty? Will we go to war anyway (without the support of anyone else in the world, with the possible exception of Great Britain)? As an American I do hate to admit it, but I'm beginning to believe what others in the world have been saying about us for many years. We are arrogant and we do feel a sense of superiority over other peoples of the world. Does that make us better and will that attitude solve anything? Will we still hold our resolve when the first 10,000 body bags of our sons and daughters come back to us? I hope we do, because we will have paid for this war with our dearest blood. I think September 11th has something to do with this also. We want someone to kick around. We are angry at the tyrants of the world and we've had enough. That's completely understandable. But the target must be the right target. If we are going to lose lives (and we will), it has to mean something and to achieve something. We are acting like a bully on the block and in historical terms, bullies have no faired too well throughout history.