Much of what is written and spoken about the Pope’s visit divides between intolerant yelling and worshipful sycophancy. But in between these two uninteresting extremes lies an opportunity for some journalism of ideas. Two more interesting examples.

• An attack by Frank Furedi on Pope Benedict’s critics here. He has a point about the intolerance shown to the Pope but he’s overpitching it when he compares the attacks made by people like Richard Dawkins or Peter Tatchell to the intolerant fanatics of the past. The fact that many of the attacks on Benedict are conformist and unreflective doesn’t make them akin to the intolerance of the past. Calling your opponent evil or immoral in the past usually invited either the mob or the church authorities to force you to shut up. Today’s Pope-haters have only the weapon of words.
• There’s only a day or two more to see this on iPlayer but I’d recommend this documentary on Benedict by Mark Dowd, an award-winning film-maker and activist who is gay and who once trained as a Dominican friar. Despite the fact that film is made in the compulsory current style in which the presenter is more important than the subject, Dowd overcomes these limitations and uses his unusual viewpoint to sketch some illuminating ideas about Catholicism today.