Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco (pictured), who made a clear but carefully veiled criticism of Italy’s Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi who is still embroiled in a scandal for allegedly having sex with a minor at one of his “sex parties” at his estate and allegedly boasting that “11 women make a queue” to have sex with him, again subtly criticized Prime Minister Berlusconi and other politicians for their behavior which is corrupting Italy’s future as a nation.
Cardinal Bagnasco stated at an Italian Bishop Conference in Rome that it was “admonishing and mortifying to acknowledge conduct that is not only contrary to public decorum but intrinsically sad and empty.”
The cardinal has even gone further by stating that the politicians are also contributing to the shame of the country by not handling the economy or the country’s image well.
Currently, Berlusconi is being investigated for allegedly having sexual relations with a minor which has momentarily shaken the Italian government as it simultaneously feels the pressure from the recent movement of migrants from conflicted North Africa and other matters.
Although the Catholic Church/Vatican is not the powerhouse it was back in the medieval days, it still possesses considerable influence in Italian society.
This means that the Church must tread carefully when criticizing Berlusconi and his conservative supporters since the Church opposes the more liberal politicians due to the possible legalization of gay marriage and stem cell research a leftist government could go for.
Cardinal Bagnasco also remarked that politicians have a great responsibility to “live a moral life” due to their influence on the “young and impressionable” and that today’s politicians were too “concerned with their own well being”.
Il bue che dà del cornuto all’asino!
Basically “the ox calling the donkey horned”, an equivalent in English would be the “pot calling the kettle black” or more simply: how freaking hypocritical!
It’s curious how Cardinal Bagnasco wasn’t there with his rant of a “moral life” or “shame” when he heard about the sexual abuse scandals and cases plaguing the Church throughout the entire world.
We don’t see prosecution of various priests occur for allegedly molesting boys or girls because of immunity laws in Italy or within the Church itself.
We don’t see Cardinal Bagnasco or any other Church official actually apologizing and compensating when millions of people are demanding answers and solutions to the Church’s own scandals.
Well, unless you count Pope Benedict XVI who has been going around England, Spain and Germany preaching about human sexuality and how people shouldn’t leave the Church because of a few priests (hundreds) molesting a few minors (a lot).
A few Europeans (hundreds of thousands) have met him with pretty, though seemingly threatening and anti-Catholic, signs and seemingly angry shouts but that’s okay since the Popemobile is available just in case.
But what happens when a politician is accused of having sex with a minor and others are being uppity about it?
Here comes Bagnasco with words of wisdom!
It also really doesn’t help the Church nor the Italian government the fact that Berlusconi is actually trying to be as pro-life/pro-Vatican as much as possible.
So we’re guessing it isn’t hypocrisy, but just the Italian version of rappers calling each other out on posing.