An attempt at a humble disagreement

I reprint here a response I made to Christopher J's Blog.

I've been fighting with this for awhile. While I'm trying to presume upon the wisdom of the Pope, while observing potential fruits from this "misunderstanding", I still do find myself thinking he was perhaps unintentionally careless about some of his phraseology. Check out this response:

Religion, Reason and Violence: Pope Benedict XVI and Islam

This line from Benedict makes me wonder:"I would like to discuss only one point-- itself rather marginal to the dialogue itself-- which, in the context of the issue of faith and reason, I found interesting and which can serve as the starting-point for my reflections on this issue."Words like "marginal" and "interesting" do not match the subject matter in my opinion. Granted, context context context. This is an academic presentation intended to promote PEACEFUL but by no means passive discussion and disagreement in regards to some serious issues undermining the process as a whole.In my limited vision, I think Pope Benedict still could have stated the same issues differently, more pastorally. For instance, where he discusess Mohammed and jihad, I think he could (should) have exhibited more sensitivity--like pretending he was speaking to a Muslim in the audience.

My point is, I think Pope Benedict was trying to speak as an academic presuming upon an academic audience, a freedom he probably once had. As Pope--especially in our media saturated times--I think he has to show a different side.I mean, let's be honest, if the Pope was going to really speak about Islam and the violent issues, he would have done so much more pointedly and convincingly. That he deals with it in this cursory manner, lends me to think that he was making an academic presumption, a presumption all of us academics can respect and enjoy, but not one suitable for these times.

To say that after the fact, almost as a felix culpa, the "true colors" of the antagonistic side of radical Islamic movements have been conveniently manifested, would be (for me) reading into Pope Benedict's speech a duplicitous agenda unfitting for a Vicar of Christ of his virtue and character.