So impressed were leaders of the Milwaukee Art Museum (MAM) that they purchased the portrait. It will be displayed this fall once renovations to the MAM are completed.
I was just dumbfounded. I mean, I couldn't make any sense of
that statement. And so I figured I needed to do something.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel quoted MAM’s Board of Trustees’ President, Don Layden, as stating:
This was never intended to be derisive, mocking or disrespectful
of the pope. It was to have a conversation about AIDS and AIDS
education. And my hope is when the piece appears in the
museum that will be the focus of the discussion.
There’s that word word again...“intend”...as in “intent” or “intention.” That is, it was nobody’s intent to offend Catholics or anyone else, for that matter.
Intend…intent…intention…
Translation: “If it wasn’t my intention to offend, then the offense taken can’t be attributed to me.”
So, if that conditional statement is true and if Pope Emeritus Benedict didn’t intend to offend either Ms. Johnson or Mr. Layden, then they shouldn’t attribute to him any offense they took from the Pope's statement. After all, fair is fair.
More importantly: What happens when the truth offends? After all, as Edward Green--a self-professed liberal who work in the fields of global HIV/AIDS and family planning for the Harvard School of Public Health--noted in a Washington Post op-ed concerning Pope Benedict's statement: "Yet, in truth, current empirical evidence supports him."
Let the discussion begin...
To read the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal, click on the following link:
http://www.jsonline.com/news/milwaukee/milwaukee-art-museums-embrace-of-condom-portrait-of-pope-draws-disgust-b99527618z1-310570591.html
To read Edward Green's op-ed in the Washington Post, click on the following link:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/27/AR2009032702825.html