ES - Rumors of a patron Saint of the Internet

Damon Huse alric at texas.net
Mon Jun 14 18:44:14 PDT 1999


Speaking of computers and religion (this isn't the first time I've heard
this stuff about a saint) I came across this passage a while back:
"Novelist Umberto Eco compared the Mac operating system to the Catholic
church.  Believers (users) must approach God (the hardware) though a
layer of churchy indirection and simplification (icons, symbols,
point-and-click). while DOS is very Protestant-- you're responsible for
achieving salvation ON YOUR OWN, and you confess your directly to GOD,
AND NO KISSY-FACE ICONS IN BETWEEN."
								from The Cyberpunk Handbook

	Alric
	(who is paying pennace, just edited my auto.exe. ohh, fun.)

Matthew Saroff wrote:
> 
> Hi,
>         I came across this web page, and it sounds plausible, any thoughts on
> this people out there?
> 
> --
> --Sfi Mordehai ben Yosef Yitzhak, Aka Matthew G. Saroff
> 
>                  _Vatican ponders patron saint for the Net _
> 
>     _14/06/99:_ The Vatican is considering a move to create a patron saint
>    of the Internet, helping millions of users around the world pray for a
>                               quicker service.
> 
>    The choice of religious saviour is thought to be St Isidore of Seville
>                          who died 1,400 years ago.
> 
>    St Isidore is the preferred choice for patron saint of the Net by many
>     users as he is credited with creating the world's first database - a
>                           20-volume encyclopaedia.
> 
>    The saintly move has not yet been confirmed by the Vatican, but it has
>      been rumoured for some time and the campaign by Internet users has
>                                been growing.
> 
>    Spokesman for the Catholic Media Office Tom Hallwood said: "There are
>     patron saints of many things, so why not let the Internet have one?
> 
>    "It is a good idea and might be able to help us all when we are about
>                                  to crash.
> 
>     "There has been no official statement from Rome but this has been an
>                idea floating around for a while, so why not?"
> 
>    The Vatican and the Roman Catholic religion are heavily involved with
>     the Internet, with the Pope broadcasting live speeches on the Web as
>           well as having Vatican Radio which can be heard online.
> 
>     It also uses three servers - large computers used to power the Net -
>      to cope with the heavy demand made on its web sites, appropriately
>                     called Raphael, Gabriel and Michael.
> 
>     The move to appoint a patron saint for the Internet has been down to
>     pressure from Catholic users around the world, predominantly Spain.
>                                      _PA_
>
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