(Sigh)--but apparently it was. The late J2P2 whipped himself on a regular basis to bring himself closer to God (and his activity was apparently audible to those in earshot at the Vatican. His Holiness even brought his flagellation equipment on vacation with him. Now THAT'S a level of devotion I know I certainly cannot begin to emulate in this lifetime--I have trouble on my days off with just getting to my grading and whatnot).
Heathen that I am, I immediately envisioned a windup toy of The Flagellating Pope, but the better half of my nature said, "Get ye behind me!" See how well my years in Catholic school have served me? I have enough brownie points now with Mother Church from that sole act of self-discipline to nearly support my very own pagan baby.
And yet, seriously--why is this self-punishment somehow not a sin? If our bodies are created in the Divine image, what on earth then made it okay for the elderly Supreme Pontiff to sleep on the bare floor (apparently mussing the papal blankets to make it look like he'd slept in the bed--a bit of a benign fib right there, Vatican-style) and beat himself with a belt? To emulate Christ? Nowhere in the New Testament did Jesus harm himself; in fact, he seems to have been a bit of a social butterfly--the man went to more feasts in his three-year ministry than I've been to in the last decade!
Food for thought, I suppose
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