Reports that there is Muslim anger towards a recent speech by the Pope sent me first to read it, and as I did so, into incredulity. As Puppy was wriggling around, I printed out the speech (provisional text) - there were 5 full pages of text. Of these 5 pages, the offensive material was contained in 3 paragraphs (40 lines, left justification, size 12 font, Times New Roman). Those 3 paragraphs recounted the Pope's recollection of a book he read, by Adel Theodore Khoury.

How a quote used early on as a starting point to illustrating faith and reason (and I suppose an underlying subtext to the objection of the use of violence in the name of religion) could be so taken out of context is beyond me. I accept that this is a sensitive topic, and indeed the Pope himself, well aware that this was so, went out of his way to emphasise that this was a quote. I wonder if all those protesting have read the speech, or simply accepted faithfully, and without use of reason. Talk about 'if you say jump, I'll say ''how high?''.

One more time. It was a speech on the topic of faith and reason, not whatever whoever wants to misconstrue it as. Read the text!