The Pope Said ... What?! (Part II)

A few astute people have shown me that the Pope might have known exactly what he was saying when he quoted a 14th century document that was critical of Islam. (See my previous post and these news items). In fact, two of those people left rather thoughtful comments here. And now ... I am doing some more reading ... and I see that the Pope is taking shots at the Jews and the Pagans. What is he thinking?? Shortly after -- or "minutes after" as the Age reports it -- offering an apology for the speech that incited Muslims around the world, the Pope was commenting on two recent Roman Catholic festivals relating to the crucifixion. He slipped this little gem into his commentary:

"We preach the crucified Christ — a scandal for the Jews, a folly for the pagans." --The Age

Do you recognize that statement at all? Here is a hint: Try cracking open 1 Corinthians. The Pope has paraphrased the words of St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 1:23: "We preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles." Note that he has changed "stumbling block" to "scandal". And he has exchanged "Pagans" for "Gentiles" (or "Greeks" in some translations). Now, why would he do this? And why would he use it on the same day he offered an apology for his apparent verbal gaffe of a few days ago? If you take the time to read the Biblical passage (1 Corinthians 1:18-30 NIV | KJV | NRSV | CEV), you will see that it deals with wisdom. Particularly, the supremacy of God's wisdom. And, by extension, I suppose the wisdom of the Christian path as well. So, we have to ask, in sharing this bit about preaching "Christ crucified" and connecting it to the wisdom of God, could the Pope in fact be claiming that he acted with great wisdom and forethought in what the media is calling his "blunder" that has enraged the Islamic community? Remember, now, that the Pope -- for millions of Catholics around the world -- is the representative of Christ on Earth. He is considered to be the only person who is in direct contact with God the Father. And he is considered to be infallible. So, there was no mistake for which to apologize. Something more is certainly going on, and this bears watching. (Aside: If I am not mistaken, the concept of Papal Infallibility is only applied to statements he makes that can be considered solemn papal definitions or ex cathedra teachings. So, if he was at a conference of scholars in Germany, can those statements be taken as ex cathedra? And if the statements are not ex cathedra, then are we back to calling the whole thing a mistake, thereby cancelling out everything I just wrote?)