Rejection, Vatican Style

Seems the Vatican is no longer accepting ambassadors from the US that aren't pro-life.

Vatican sources told Il Giornale that their support for abortion disqualified Ms Kennedy and other Roman Catholics President Barack Obama had been seeking to appoint.

Mr Obama was reportedly seeking to reward John F Kennedy's daughter, who publicly gave her support to his election bid. She had been poised to replace Hillary Clinton as New York senator, but dropped out amid criticism that she lacked enough experience for the job.

The Italian paper said that the Vatican strongly disapproved of Mr Obama's support for abortion and stem cell research. The impasse over the ambassadorial appointment threatens to cloud his meeting with the Pope during a G8 summit in Italy in July.

This is something of a serious problem at this point. The Pope is clearly furious at Obama, and blocking the US Ambassador to the Vatican is not a step to be taken lightly. But it gets worse:

"It's imperative, it's essential that the person who represents us to the Holy See be a person who has pro-life values. I hope the President doesn't make that mistake," he told the Boston Herald. "She said she was pro-choice. I don't assume she's going to change that, which is problematic."

Point of order: Abortion is legal in the US. Going on that logic, why not refuse to recognize the US diplomatically until Obama bans abortion in the country? It would be like Iraq insisting the Ambassador be a Muslim who publicly opposes the war or something. Obama's going to have to decide if the Catholic Church is running US policy or not. Regardless if this is a pro-life/pro-choice issue, this is a slap in the face of the President.

Then again...he's the Pope.