Item 1:

Pope Benedict XVI said Monday that pharmacists have a right to use conscientious objection to avoid dispensing emergency contraception or euthanasia drugs — and told them they should also inform patients of the ethical implications of using such drugs. ... "Pharmacists must seek to raise people's awareness so that all human beings are protected from conception to natural death, and so that medicines truly play a therapeutic role," Benedict said. Benedict said conscientious objector status would "enable them not to collaborate directly or indirectly in supplying products that have clearly immoral purposes such as, for example, abortion or euthanasia."

Okay, first of all, Your Assholeyness, emergency contraception is just that - contraception - and has nothing to do with fucking abortion. That's one.

Benedict's comments resonated strongly in Italy, where pharmacists are required to fill prescriptions regardless of their moral or ethical positions, according to Federfarma, Italy's national federation representing 15,500 private pharmacies. In a statement, the organization said the law would have to be changed to allow for conscientious objection, but noted that the change might result in pharmacists objecting to dispensing basic contraception or other hormonal drugs prescribed for medical reasons. The issue came to a head on Monday in Chile, when the government warned it could close drugstores that refuse to sell the morning-after pill, which has been legal in Chile since last year for sale to girls as young as 14. The country's three largest drug store chains have not been selling the drugs, claiming they could not buy them locally. The government responded by fining the stores and importing thousands of doses.

Good for Chile. Good for Federfarma for pushing back, although far more weakly than the issue deserves.

Pharmacists are licensed medical professionals. If you have a moral objection to doing your fucking job, then quit and go work for some Catholic hospital or just go into a different line of work, because you obviously didn't realize this one involves dispensing medicine.

Item 2:

The Vatican took on Spain's Socialist government Sunday, criticizing its social policies as the church beatified nearly 500 victims of leftist persecution during the country's civil war era. The ceremony was the largest mass beatification ever by the Vatican, which supported the fascist dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco during and after his war against the leftists. Some in Spain questioned the timing of the beatification of the 498 martyrs, which came three days before Spain's parliament is expected to pass a Socialist-sponsored law that will for the first time formally condemn Franco's rule and order the removal of all fascist symbols from the country. ... Critics say the Vatican was hitting back at the government by simultaneously beatifying the two bishops, 24 priests and 462 members of religious orders, as well as a deacon, a subdeacon, a seminary student and seven lay Catholics. Since the late 1980s the church has beatified nearly 500 other clergy killed in the war, but in a series of smaller ceremonies.

Get that? The Church supported Franco and the Spanish fascists, the allies of the Nazis. They shot teachers who didn't want the Church to control the schools and anyone suspected of "anti-clericalism". The Church picked sides in a civil war and a number of its priests were killed before the Nazis came in and won the war for them. Now they put their dead fascist supporters on the road to sainthood.

In his homily, [Cardinal Jose] Saraiva Martins took aim at Socialist legislation that facilitates divorce and gay marriages, as well as the administration's scrapping of plans by a previous conservative government to make religion an obligatory subject in schools. Criticizing all three initiatives, Saraiva Martins said there was a need to protect the family "founded on the sole and indissoluble marriage between a man and woman, on the primary right for parents to educate their children."

And the Church is upset that people are allowed to marry and divorce as they will, and that (the Catholic) religion is not taught in schools on the public's dime. You with me so far? Then there is this:

Ties between the church and the Spanish government, which took office in 2004, have also grown tense over the government's attempts to make the church more self-financing. As of a year ago, Spain no longer makes direct payments to the church, instead allowing taxpayers a choice whether to divert 0.7 percent of their taxes or not.

So, the freedom-hating, theocratic fascist-lovers in Rome are upset that Spain no long directly pays tribute to them. The Pope demands you kiss his ring and then tithe. Fuck him.