The Flock is mourning - Baaaaah said the sheep..

Now that His Worshipfulness, The Padishah Ayatollah Lord Protector and CEO of the Greek Church-in-State Inc. lies embalmed for all his flock to pay their respects, voices of mournful indignation arise with patriotic/religious fervour that it is leaders of this calibre that our nation needs.

Εσεις κυριε με την περικεφαλαία, προσκυνήσατε; Φιλε οδηγέ, έβαλες ΦΛΑΣ στη μπαταρία;

Besides the obvious, i.e. the Makarios farce and the tragedy it led to, I think it is time to reflect on the nature of such sentiments. Pure politics, gentlemen. Pure politics.What better opportunity for politicians to divert the attention from embarassing scandals and ingratiate themselves to the flock with public displays of mourning?

From the analytical wisdom of the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood that has spent millennia manipulating politics to guide humanity to maturity, from Frank Herbert's Dune Universe:

"Almost any subject had political elements....As emotions were whipped up, political forces came more and more innto the foreground. This put lie! to that old nonsense about "separation of church and state". Nothing more susceptible to emotional heat than religion.
No wonder we distrust emotions"

" 'Democracy is a stupid idea anyway!'
' We agree. It's demagogue prone. That's a disease to which electoral systems are vulnerable' "

" 'Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.'
' Wrong, Dama. Something more subtle but far more pervasive is at work. We've said it often enough but few hear us. Power attracts the corruptible.' "

"But oh, the perils of leadership in a species so anxious to be told what to do. How little they know of what they created by their demands. Leaders made mistakes. And those mistakes, amplified by the numbers who followed without questioning, moved inevitably toward great disasters.
Lemming behaviour."

(Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune, italics from the original, bold by me)