Troika

[c9]

Knowing that many of my friends have different interests, I present several different items for comment:

1. This morning, when there's normally mindless pap, a local radio station accidentally allowed actual conversational debate to leak through: one DJ was defending his decision to never vaccinate his children, and the others were talking about how diseases used to wipe out thousands or millions every few decades, but vaccination has curbed this. His take was that "humans are the only species that does not allow nature to take its course," i.e. Darwinism. Thoughts?

2. The Pope has had a feeding tube inserted to help his caloric intake. a) would the reports have placed feeding tube in the headlines if Terry Schiavo hadn't taught us all the lingo? b) He is *so* not long for this world. Watch for the white smoke at the Vatican, kids.

3. Yesterday, school buses throughout large sections of Ontario north of London were delayed for two full hours. By fog. WTF?

Comments

[nihilicious.livejournal.com]

It works this way: The moment a Pope dies, a new Pope is automatically created. All that remains is for the College of Cardinals to find and recognize the new Pope. It has happened that a Pope has died and a new Pope created, only to have the old Pope revived. In that scenario, there are effectively two popes. One lives in Rome, the other in Avignon, France. They work together to fight evil, but occasionally there is tension between them (we call that "the Great Schism".) In the end, though, they end up being friends and fighting side-by-side, slaying vampires to the end.

[jpman.livejournal.com]

Didn't those two Pope excommunicate each other? I may be remembering wrong, but wasn't it a case of they both died around the same time and another Pope was chosen that both factions agreed upon? I only dimly recall this bit though.

The Great Schism was when Eastern and Western Christianity spilt -- Constantinople and Rome.

http://www.kosovo.com/schism.html

[jpman.livejournal.com]

Wait, there seems to be two Great Schisms...

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/grtschism1.html

[nihilicious.livejournal.com]

No, I'm pretty sure both Popes were still alive in the series finale, though a lot of other minor characters were killed off. I distinctly remember the look on Pope Buffy's face.

[jpman.livejournal.com]

A brief schism history:

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13539a.htm

Each side went through a bunch of Pope's before it all ended. Boniface was dead long before the reconciliation and had been succeeded by Innocent VII.

Pope Buffy's face, Pope Boniface... amusing :)

[nihilicious.livejournal.com]

At this point, I feel obliged to disclose that I was making a lame joke conflating Catholic dogma with Buffy the Vampire-Slayer plotlines.

For greater clarity: there were no vampires involved in the Great Schism.

[jpman.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I caught that. Being a Buffy fanatic, I was amused.