It’s all Bush’s fault

It’s George Bush’s fault. Everything is George Bush’s fault. Why? Well, because it’s always someone else’s fault. “This is reaching the level of hilarity. Except it’s so sad,” says Steven at The Metaphysical Peregrine. And I think he is right. One might also say, yes, it would be funny, except it is happening to me, to us Americans. You have all my European solidarity—after all every country has its own Dems and liberal media…

'I killed Mgr. Padovese! Allah Akbar!'

Bishop Luigi Padovese, the apostolic vicar of Anatolia—that is the Vatican’s representative in Turkey—who was stabbed by his Turkish driver Thursday, besides being a high-level scholar and among the major experts on St. Paul, was a good and wise man. Just like another Italian priest, Father Andrea Santoro, who was killed in Turkey in 2006. And the man arrested in that case was also described as mentally unstable. Coincidence? Well, everything is possible in this crazy world, even though, to tell the truth, I don’t believe in coincidences. And I’m not the only one. AsiaNews.it:

As the days pass, new details emerge on the story of murder and the alleged "insanity" of the assassin. The doctors who performed the autopsy reveal that Mgr. Padovese had knife wounds all over his body, but especially in the heart (at least 8). His head was almost completely detached from his neck, attached to his body by only the skin of the back of the neck.
Even the dynamics of the killing is clearer: the Bishop was stabbed in his house. He had the strength to go out the door of the house, bleeding and crying for help and there he was killed. Perhaps only when he fell to the ground, was his head cut off.
Witnesses said they heard the bishop cry out for help. But more importantly, is that they heard screams of Murat immediately after the murder. According to these sources, he climbed on the roof of the house shouted: "I killed the great Satan! Allah Akbar! ".
This call coincides perfectly with the idea of beheading, making sense that it is like a ritual sacrifice against evil. This correlates with the murders of ultranationalist groups and Islamic fundamentalists who apparently want to eliminate Christians from Turkey.
Moreover, according to a Turkish newspaper, Milliyet on June 4, the murderer had told police that he his actions were the result of a " divine revelation."

As it was not enough, the timing of Padovese’s killing was significant, as the bishop was scheduled to travel to Cyprus for Pope Benedict’s visit last weekend. Yes, the timing was highly suspect. Cyprus—do you remember? A former British colony, Cyprus became an independent republic in 1960. Following violence between ethnic Greek Cypriots and minority Turkish Cypriots, Turkey invaded in 1974, leading to the division of the island between the internationally recognized south and the north, which is only recognized by Turkey.

On his first day there,

Benedict was greeted warmly by both Catholics and Orthodox, but quickly saw how tense the situation on the small island is, as a Cypriot Orthodox bishop told him that Turkey was trying to take over the entire nation.
“It has turned the Orthodox Christians of Cyprus out of their ancestral homes, where they had lived for centuries,” said His Beatitude Chyrsostomos II at an outdoor ceremony in Paphos. “They want to make everything Greek and Christian disappear from occupied Cyprus.”

And to think that when Father Andrea Santoro was killed in Trabzon in 2006, Bishop Padovese succeeded in finding words of peace and kindness: “We forgive the one who carried out this gesture,” he said at the funeral Mass. “It is not by destroying those who think differently that conflicts are resolved,” he added. “The only way to follow is that of dialogue, mutual knowledge, closeness and sympathy.” Unfortunately, in order to establish a dialogue there must be two sides, two interlocutors. Hopefully alive.

Commenting between tears the death of Bishop Padovese, Father Andrea Santoro’s sister, Maddalena, said, “I hope that eyes will open in Turkey to try to understand and comprehend what there is behind this situation. Because Muslims must also be able to accept Christians, without fearing that we wish to convert people.” In the meantime many people in the Western countries are learning something new everyday about Turkey.