Benedict XVI should shut his big mouth. As Vatican expert John Allen (US-based National Catholic Reporter) said in an on-line editorial, the Pope is often "remarkably tone-deaf to how his pronouncements may sound to people who don't share his intellectual and cultural premises".

After offending Muslims and the Islam eight months ago, Benedict said on May 13, when he was still in Brazil: "Christianity was not the imposition of a foreign culture," and "Christ was the Saviour (America's natives) silently yearned for." Not imposed??? Is he serious? Off course the Pope's convenient revisionism pissed off many leaders of indigenous groups.

Our beloved and kind Pope also said the resurgence of pre-Columbian religions would be "a step backward"; now we have pissed off people all the way from Ushuaia to Mexico.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez strongly asked Benedict for an apology, and I really hate to say this, but I have to recognize Chavez is right on this one. He said:

"With all due respect your Holiness, apologize because there was a real genocide here and, if we were to deny it, we would be denying our very selves."

Off course now Benedict is apologizing - well, kind of.

Now he said: "While we do not overlook the various injustices and sufferings which accompanied colonization, the Gospel has expressed and continues to express the identity of the peoples in this region and provides inspiration to address the challenges of our globalized era," and "Certainly, the memory of a glorious past cannot ignore the shadows that accompanied the work of evangelizing the Latin American continent,"

The Pope also said "It is not possible, indeed, to forget the sufferings and injustices inflicted by colonizers on the indigenous populations, whose fundamental human rights were often trampled on". Not possible? I could swear he had forgotten all about the horrors of Colonization, when he spoke about this issue in Brazil.

Benedict should shut his mouth. Saying anything that comes to his mind, disregarding "people who don't share his intellectual and cultural premises", is really bad for the Catholic Church's image. Besides, this kind of not-so-Christian statements really shouldn't be coming out of a Pope's mouth.

Giving lame excuses and explanations afterwards doesn't make it better.