In not wanting The Pope to visit uk at the taxpayers expense?

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Apparently The visit wil cost 12m pounds. That's 12 million pounds to be pinched from other budgets. For a man who has been responsible for covering up crimes against children.

My MP will receive an email today and I will make my abhorrence very clear.

I have masses of compassion and generosity for the christians/catholics in our country demonstrated by guaranteeing their free school meals and their decent education with the tax I pay.

Spending however many million £ on a foreign national child abuse apologist is a lot less important than making sure children are well nourished and social services have sufficient funding to check they are ok.

And if the pope had an ounce of decency he would see that as a higher priority too.

100m £ worth of compassion ? I'd rather have compassion for all the those people to be affected by the cuts that 100m would do something to assuage.

queenceleste - no, the Catholic Church can't disband. But it could make a proper effort to make sure all abusing priests are defrocked, and ALL evidence is handed over to the police.

and meanwhile the pope could quit parading around the streets of foreign countries surrounded by school-children.

the G20 summit cost £70m to police, and was all in one location. The cost of the pope could easily be that much.

GimmatheNome - seems that's happening. The part of Holy See visit, uk paid, and then part of religious visits, church paid. Wonder how much the Sarcozy visit cost?

but he is not visiting as a Head of State - he is visiting as the Pontiff of the catholic Church - a very different thing.

If I were a Catholic, i would be very annoyed that an organization as rich as the Catholic Church is also apparently, expecting ordinary catholics to donate money to pay for the papal visit.

WE spent £500,000 on travel expenses for prince Andrew!!!! Why are WE having to pay? What does he actually do? Each time Charlie does his green bit and takes the Royal train ,it cost £200,000,again we are paying for it.
If the pope wants to come ,let the Vatican pay,like the olympics, I wont benefit from this visit one jot.I think we can rest assured St Tony and the Blessed Cherie will get front row seats tho'

Oh, hang on, do you think Tony Blair will be made a saint?

If Catholics in this country want him to come, then the RC Church are welcome to organise and pay for it.
I don't think it is any business of the UK government at all - I see it as a Church business visit....though with the recent child abuse history and the 'No condoms, we're Catholic' policy for AIDS ridden Africa, I'm not sure he'd get the support he thinks he will in any case.

seeker but he IS visting as a 'head of state' that's why we are paying so much for it.

JPII visited in the 80s on a pastoral visit only, and not as 'Head of State'

bluecardi - the main expense is security, that's apparently coming out of police force budgets.

fallon, ITA, we do spend too much on the royal family but much of Andrew's travel is for promoting British businesses overseas. If there's a single thing the country needs it's more exports so this may be worthwhile.

londonartemis, my argument is that catholic taxpayers have paid for it in their taxes.

We live in a democracy. We can't base all the national expenditure on your opinion - can we now?

Or maybe Cherie is aiming at sainthood? It would account for the invitation.

Grimma, I can't really imagine he closes any deals does he? I mean maybe he can go OOO AAHhhhh at military stuff but from what I understand he plays a lot of golf.

Fine but in my opinion let his mother support him. She could see a Leonardo drawing and support him for the rest of his life. Or a couple of Faberge eggs. It's not as if she puts it in the British Museum where we might all enjoy it.

I think we should axe all payments towards all Royals other than Her Madge. And all Chuck's humungous tax breaks shniedied around his Prince's Trust thing and Duchy Orshmanics.

if prince andrew went on a State Visit anywhere, I hope the locals would have the good taste to boo him.

I only said 'may' - I'm cynical enough to think that golf with the Right People may be more influential than it should be.

But anyway, wasting money on the royal family is no argument at all for wasting it on a papal visit - 'two wrongs'.

It's an obscene waste of money.

So, if he is coming as Head of State (which I didn;t realize - I am very ignornat) whta's in it for us? State visits are intended generally to be of mutual benefit to the countries involved - I can see what's in it for the Vatican. What does briatain get out of it?

Or even Britain?

The pope is an utter disgrace, and all decent minded Roman Catholics should have washed their hands of him and his predecessors a long time ago.

I agree the church has been and will on occasion still be disgraceful. But the whole institution is not the same as one terrible fault. It's a bit more complicated than that.

I think if you look at some history you'll see that things tend not be quite so simple.

The RC church does do some good and it is a positive part of many many many people's lives. To dismiss it out of hand is as ignorant and prejudiced as saying "Italians are stupid" or "Germans are nasty".

It's just not very bright, knee jerk ignorance.

We live in a democracy that reflects a large number of the needs of various minorities funded by the tax paying pounds of different interest groups.

Take it up with your MP if you think it's so wrong.

For example. Modern medicine in very recent history produced Nazi doctors and engenics but we don't condemn ALL doctors or ALL modern medicine do we?

I think the behaviour of modern drug companies is more morally bankrupt than the RC Church and I wouldn't suggest closing them all down because I'm neither ignorant nor incapable of complex thought.

If you could see the work of everyday Roman Catholics on the ground all over the world you might have to consider that their respect for their leadership is their business, in error or not, it is two thousand years of an organisation. You can't just see it in terms of the last 20 years. That is, very simply, ignorance of history and ignorance of the views of others. It's the kind of thinking that wants to bring back capital punishment. It's just narrow minded in my view.

'I think the behaviour of modern drug companies is more morally bankrupt than the RC Church '

Don't understand - since when have drug companies been in a position of moral authority over millions of people?

Actually, that"s quite a good slogan "The Pope! Less morally bankrupt than Big Pharma!"

they have more than moral authority, in Africa they control life and death with the prices of their HIV medications. In the USA their prices are too high for a massive number of the population who have no insurance. In their promotion of anti depressants they help keep millions of people in a medicated trance past it's actual use.
Maybe they're as bad as the Church but they are certainly morally bankrupt. But I see and have seen where the Catholic church does and can do a lot of good.

sorry, of course the drug companies do do some good as well!