According to the Times of London,

"THE Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Cormac Murphy—O'Connor, used his Christmas sermon to attack the way that Bethlehem has been treated. ...He described it as a town "corralled" and "blocked in" by checkpoints, with the economy decimated by the security measures taken by Israel in its own fight against terror. Pleading for the soul of Bethlehem, the Cardinal said: "The Christ Child is crying for the town of his birth."

Well. Last time I looked, towns were inanimate creatures. The Cardinal is giving us a metaphor. But metaphors don't suffer; people do. The reasons for Israeli security measures are pretty clear to those who have watched Israeli buses and pizza places blown up over the years, with human blood and body parts all over the place. Security measures like checkpoints are no fun, but they don't compare to being killed with your kids while sitting in a pizza parlor.

I often wonder how clergy can live with themselves, calmly watching years of television stories showing Israeli civilians wantonly attacked — babies, children, women, men — and then going on the public record supporting the terrorists. Armed Palestinians are attacked when they assault Israel; unarmed Israelis are attacked just for living. Such an elementary moral distinction must have been clear enough to the Archbishop's parents, who knew all about the London Blitz. But the higher morality of the new Church makes heroes of those who wantonly murder innocents, and blames the victims.

James Lewis   12 27 05

Herb Meyer writes:

The Cardinal James Lewis write about is Roman Catholic — not part of the Church of England, often called the Aglican church.  It's a distinction that can, sort of, be fudged for the purposes of journalism since it's about the UK.