Why Bush Gave Pope Benedict a Walking Stick

From the June 24-30 issue of National Catholic Register:

DALLAS — A walking stick is the unlikely center of a debate about political protocol, theological precision and news-marketing as a corporal work of mercy.

President Bush gave the odd, carved walking stick to Pope Benedict XVI on June 9 on a visit to Rome. In some quarters, the gift became a laughingstock.

As a post on one Catholic blog put it, “You go all the way to Rome and you give the Pope a stick! Mr. Bush, has America nothing better to offer?”

But stick supporters point out that the staff, inscribed with the Ten Commandments, was one of several gifts of state the president presented to Pope Benedict that day. And the fact that the president gave it to the Pope may have kept a former homeless man and his wife off the streets and in their rented apartment.

First, the case against the stick.

Detractors point out that not only was the stick homely, but the version of the Decalogue carved into it was the Protestant one. Bush seemed to commit a further faux pas when he forgot to address the Pope with the usual honorific, “Your Holiness,” and used “sir” instead.

The Pope did not seem fazed by the choice of words — or offended that the president did not come bearing something more precious than a cane.

“The Ten Commandments?” he asked curiously.

“The Ten Commandments, yes, sir,” President Bush responded.

One critic called it “an embarrassing breach of protocol.”

“Protestants don’t necessarily recognize the Pope as ‘his holiness,’ but George Bush wasn’t there representing himself. He was there representing the United States,” said Frank Flinn, a professor of religious studies and a practicing Catholic at Washington University in St. Louis.

Furthermore, Flinn said, any gift featuring the Ten Commandments should have included the version used by the Pope and most Catholics.

[More]

My Comments:
Whatever the man's faults, and they are many, President Bush doesn't deserve this sort of niggling, nit-picking, trumped-up controversy. In fact, this is about the most trifling criticism I've seen aimed at this President in a long time. Those who would use this event to disparage the President have, in my view, revealed themselves as far more malicious, mean-spirited, and full of ill will than the man they seek to criticize. It's just piling on for the sake of piling on.

Besides, it's not like the guy (1) inappropriately received Communion as a Protestant attending a Catholic Mass and then, (2) when called on it by this Nation's preeminent Catholic prelate, had his press secretary go out and presumptuously suggest that Cardinal O’Connor was unfamiliar with Catholic doctrine regarding the Holy Eucharist and then, (3) for good measure, targeted His Excellency for anti-terrorism surveilance.