He's Dead! No, he's still alive! (nauseating news coverage for 14 hours). He's Dead! (then more nauseating news coverage)

I must thank the recently departed Supreme Pontiff, Archbishop and Metropolitan of Rome,Vicar of Christ, etc, etc, for cutting short the "Pope Death Watch 2005 Show" with Paula Zahn & Andersen Cooper with token Euro-accented Christiane Anampour"(with few commercial interruptions!). It was getting ridiculous.

There's alot out there on the death of pope and his legacy. So I won't go into it too much.
As a lapsed Catholic (aren't we all?) I look at the death of the pope, like much of his reign and religion, with much mixed feelings. I have no regrets being raised as a Catholic. It taught me to be patient and kind to others and to be responsible for your actions. But most importantly I'd say it also made me a more cynical and critical person. I stopped going to church when I was 18. I went on and off for several years after that, mostly to make my parents happy. The pew kept getting colder and colder over the years. The prayers became as hollow and empty as the icons on the wall. For me, the notion of God, or anything bigger than myself was just that, a notion, an idea. Nothing more than that. So for a while I flirted with atheism, but then I noticed that atheism was as dogmatic as any other religion. Ultimately, I became comfortable with a quasi-agnostic view of god and life in general. I am at a time in my life in which the question of belief is becoming more important to me. Perhaps I am getting older, or perhaps I need a little more meaning in my life. I suppose it's not the answer to the question of belief that is important, but living in the question.