The Protect the Pope website is still doing a good job, monitoring secular press and online coverage of the Pope’s activities: it is currently drawing attention to an article entitled “What the Pope really said in Spain” by the writer Colleen Carroll Campbell, posted on a US website called stltoday (based in St Louis, Missouri), which it says “is well worth reading in its entirety”.
So I read it, and it is. The whole thing gave one a remarkable sense of déjà vu:
“From the screeching headlines and sour press reports, you would think Pope Benedict XVI's recent trip to Spain was a colossal flop. What else could you call a visit from an 83-year-old cleric who spent two straight days ranting against gays and abortion amid swarms of angry protesters? And we all know that's what happened, because the mainstream media told us so.
“Never mind that little in the transcripts or live television coverage of the papal visit supported that storyline. Or that those anti-pope protests trumpeted as the trip's most newsworthy event were more minuscule than massive. The gay rights activists who staged a 'kiss-in' against Benedict in Barcelona numbered about 200. The pilgrims who gathered to cheer him numbered a quarter million.
“Let's not dwell on numbers. What matters are words, and according to the Associated Press, Benedict devoted his to 'attacking' and 'blasting' Spain's lax abortion and marriage laws.”
