Lightning struck the building where the Republic presidential primary debate was being held last night and messed with the sound system, just as Rudy Giuliani was explaining whhy he dissents from Catholic belief on abortion. They all had a chuckle, the other candidates backing away and Giuliani making a joke.
“Look, for someone who went to parochial schools all his life, this is a very frightening thing that’s happening right now,” Giuliani chuckled.
For those who refuse to see, even a burning bush would not convince. I might have told the story before on the blog about the Unitarian-Universalist minister in my hometown of Canton, Mass., when I was a kid. I remember reading in the newspaper how the atheist minister (those wacky UUs!) laughed off the incident in which a lightning bolt struck his office, hit his bookshelf, burned through the books until it reached the Bible and burned through until reaching the page on which the verse about misleading shepherds and millstones. And he laughed about the coincidence. What else could he do?
Thomas has the video of the moment.
Forgive me, Lord, but would that You had better aim.
Oh, His aim was perfect. My family cheered! Of course that was our bishop that Giuliani was about to dis. The timing was wonderful!
The funniest thing of all was the other candidates backing away. Hilarious.
It’s interesting that Giuliani joked that it was frightening. In other words, he knows he’s doing the wrong thing. If he’d been talking about, say, how we can better feed the poor, he wouldn’t have thought to make that joke.
Indeed it was. Giuliani might have joked about it, but the other candidates were gonna give him plenty of room for his answer.
Just because Rudy is speaking in a joking manner doesn’t mean he thought that was funny. That event has, by his own admission, changed what he is or isn’t willing to say in response to Bishop Tobin’s criticism. The laughter isn’t a cruel or in-your-face sort, but a normal human defensive response. He doesn’t know what to do, so he laughs.