Status-Q

Mmm. So the Pope quotes some words from a medieval manuscript and emphasises that they are not his own. In response, a Somalian cleric named Abubukar Malin says that “whoever offends our Prophet Mohammed should be killed on the spot by the nearest Muslim” and calls for revenge on the Pope. Which seems like a suitably proportionate response, and was no doubt calculated to improve Islam’s image around the world.

As for Mr Kapusuz, the senior Turkish politician who says that the Pope, for quoting somebody else’s words, should now be put in the same category as Hitler and Mussolini, one can only wonder what kind of history lessons he ever had. Still, this is a very serious insult to the leader of one of the world’s great religions, and he wasn’t even quoting somebody else, so I guess he should probably be killed on the spot too. No doubt he’s anticipated that as a likely response from the Vatican.