A conversation between Rocky and his manager in Rocky II:

Gazo: How’s about investing in condominiums? It’s safe.

Rocky: Condominiums?

Gazo: Yeah, condominiums.

…Rocky: I never use ’em.

Just had a conversation with a friend of mine who’s familiar with the new interview book with the Pope, and we were laughing (albeit dryly) about the fact that there’s a whole lot more in Light of the World than condoms and it’s all far more interesting.

Some fun personal stuff:

– Benedict does NOT use the exercise bicycle set up for him.

– He watches the news.

– Favorite films: Two Suitcases: Story of St. Josephine Bakhita andan Italian movie seriesabout a fictional priest, Don Cammillo, and his archenemy the communist mayor Peppone.

– He wears a wristwatch from the 60s or 70s.

– He does not collect a salary.

On a more serious note:

– The Pope knows that he’s subject to personal error. (Now, if a celebrity gets up and says this on Oprah, we all cheer. Start cheering folks.)

– What the clerical sex abuse scandal looked like to him:

“Suddenly so much filth”…like “the crater of a volcano, out of which suddenly a great cloud of filth came, darkening and soiling everything.”

– On the manner of handling the sex abuse crisis:

“We responded to the matter in America immediately with revised, stricter norms. In addition, collaboration between the secular and ecclesiastical authorities was improved. Would it have been Rome’s duty, then, to say to all the countries expressly: Find out whether you are in the same situation? Maybe we should have done that. For me, in any case, it was a surprise that abuse also existed on that scale in Germany.”

– On the situation of the sex abuse crisis in Ireland:

“In Ireland, the problem is altogether specific – there is a self-enclosed Catholic society, so to speak, which remained true to its faith despite centuries of oppression, but in which, then, evidently certain attitudes were also able to develop….We must examine thoroughly how it was possible for that to happen, and at the same time what can be done so that something like that does not happen again.”

– On Fr. Maciel and the Legion:

“Naturally corrections must be made, but by and large the congregation is sound….A new structure is needed so that they do not fall between the cracks but are guided correctly so as to be able to continue performing a service to the Church and to mankind.”

– On freedom and morality:

“We must acknowledge again that we cannot simply live in any way we please. That freedom cannot be arbitrariness. That it is imperative to learn to exercise a freedom that is responsibility.”

Stay tuned for more…