Thou shalt not hog the middle lane

The Pope has this week issued guidelines for the “Pastoral care of the road“, essentially 10 commandments for motoring. This piece of work contains such gems as, “Thou shalt not make rude gestures behind the steering wheel” and that cars can be an “occassion of sin”. Presumably it makes no mention of “Thou shalt not stand in the back of a vehicle without wearing a seatbelt”.

The full list of commandments reads:

The highway to heaven

1 You shall not kill

2 The road shall be for you a means of communion between people and not of mortal harm

3 Courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you to deal with unforeseen events

4 Be charitable and help your neighbour in need, especially victims of accidents

5 Cars shall not be for you an expression of power and domination or an occasion for sin

6 Charitably convince the young and not-so-young not to drive when they are not in a fit condition

7 Support the families of accident victims

8 Bring guilty motorists and their victims together so they can experience forgiveness

9 On the road, protect the more vulnerable party

10 Feel responsible towards others

The Vatican states that, “as a consequence of transgressions and negligence, 1.2 million people die on the roads each year. That’s a sad reality, and at the same time a great challenge for society and the Church.” This may indeed be true, but what about the 24.7 million people currently living with AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa? What about the Vaticans refusal to condone contraception, a move that would by no means irradicate AIDS but would go a step towards a reducing the problem.

Dont’ go rushing to the bookshop to buy your updated Highway Code just yet

This entry was posted on 20/06/2007 at 01:17 pm and is filed under Driving. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.