DailyOh! Why Church can't see beyond celibacy to 'absolute garbage' kiwi pizza
Hi there,
The world appeared to be a calmer place today. Not all peaceful-peaceful; just comparatively calmer.
Ya, the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests are going on, Iran and the US have still not put their swords back into their scabbards, but ya, the protests were not violent anywhere, and neither were US and Iran trying to shoot each other’s planes or people down.
The Vatican church, however, is caught in a bit of turmoil.
The church is good at putting a lid on all its controversies and scandals, so it is never out in the open like a full-blown crisis, but it's brewing nevertheless.
It all started with a book whose co-author, former Head of Church, Pope Benedict XVI, has denied co-authoring. Are we confusing you?
Achha, hang on. Let’s begin from where it all began.
A French newspaper on Sunday published extracts of a book called The Depth of Our Hearts. The paper presented the book as a collaboration between Benedict and the ultra-conservative cardinal Robert Sarah.
In the book, Benedict says only celibate people should be allowed to become priests of Catholic church.
Now, the question of who should become a priest came up because the church has been facing a shortage of priests. The book comes at a time when Pope Francis, the current Pope, is considering whether married men should be allowed to become priests just so they have more of 'em priests.
But why is the church so hung up on celibacy? In our prudish world, the S-word is bad. Sex is bad. But in our religious worlds, it is sin.
Jesus, after all, lived a chaste life and never married. Jesus is also believed to be a product of celibacy. Now, now! Don’t think biology. We are talking mythology.
So, after the excerpt was published, Benedict got an earful for letting himself be used by the Catholic Church’s ultra-conservative guys to undermine Pope Francis. Why? Because Pope Francis is apparently more liberal than his predecessors. Now come on. At least he is talking about married men being allowed to be priests! (Even if it is only because there is a lack of priests.)
The shortage, let us tell you, is so bad that there are places that can’t have a mass because there are no priests. Now, how many would give up the carnal life for priesthood? (Not AS carnal a life as Diego's, but the usual.)
So, have all Catholic priests been celibate?
Church sex scandals have now become an open secret. Have you watched Spotlight? Do it if you haven’t. You will know what repressed sexual desires can do.
So despite the clergy's sacred oath of celibacy, Pope Julius II (1503 to 1513), reportedly had several mistresses and at least one female love child. Some also say that he had two other daughters who died during childhood.
It got so bad that in 1511, a council also said that he "was a sodomite covered with shameful ulcers". Yeah, not a pleasing sight, that.
Coming back to the celibacy debate, Benedict and Francis differ on more than one controversial issue. Wanna dig deeper?
Let Netflix help you. Watch The Two Popes, where Anthony Hopkins plays Benedict and Jonathan Pryce takes on as Francis. They have days-long conversation before Benedict announces his historic resignation.
So, this weekend, after a wholesome meal, sit down with a cup of chai and plate of kanda-bhaji (do you call it peyaji?), and watch The Two Popes talk it out. Talking of kanda, pyaaz or onion, its prices more precisely, you would have noticed that the numbers have come down. From Rs 120, the vegetable is now selling at Rs 80-Rs 70.
Wipe those tears.
Onion prices, we are constantly told, have brought down governments. But do you know onion played a role in bringing Indira Gandhi back to power in 1980? Now we know what Emergency did to Indira Gandhi in the 1977 elections. Indira Gandhi spoke a lot about the high onion prices. What happened next? The Congress came back to power (here's an opinion poll on that from 1977). You know what price the kitchen staple was selling at then?
Re 1!
And you may find it ironical, even comical, that the same onion went up to Rs 6 in 1981, under the same Indira.
Since we are talking about food, let’s talk some more about food. What else is there to life, right?
Okay, we are cutting out the melodrama! Not talking about life but talking about food. This new pizza caught our fancy. We are assuming it caught yours too. The kiwi pizza. Have you had it?
The internet says it is absolute garbage so we are wary of trying it. If you tried it and liked it, and even if you tried it and didn’t like it, tell us what you loved or hated (in the comment section below).
But not before we tell you why pizza is our Word Of The Day. It is common belief that pizza was an invention by the Italians. Remember how Elizabeth Gilbert in Eat, Pray, Love relishes it when she reaches Italy during her solo trip around the world? We bet you do. Oh! No problem even if you don’t. Just watch it when you find the time (it's on Netflix and Amazon Prime both, so life's a little easier).
However, the history of pizza goes back to the ancient times in the Middle East. The Greeks, Egyptians, Armenians and Israelis were making some derivative of pizza in the ancient times. It is perhaps for this reason that the origin of the word remains fuzzy. It is Italian for ‘pie’. Some say it could have come from Latin 'pitch' or Greek 'pitta'. What does it mean? A form of bread, we're guessing.
Feeling hungry already? We here sure are.
So, we will let you go but not before we tell you about Tania Shergill. So, today, on the 72nd Army Day, Tania Shergil became the first woman parade adjutant to lead an all-men contingent in the Army Day Parade. She is the fourth generation in her family to serve the Army.
If you no longer watch the Republic Day parade, or if you have never watched it, do it this January 26. Only for Shergill if nothing else.
Fills your heart with pride? Ours too.
On that note, see you tomorrow!
Also read: How Diego’s sex drive saved the world to what Afzal Guru knew about Davinder Singh