According to
The Scotsman today, the
Pope has just pronounced
Saint Isidore of Seville the
patron saint of "
Internet users and
computer programmers". The reason for the choice was based on Isidore's "pioneering" comilation of the "first"
encyclopaedia, as described excellently by
legbagede above. Isidore is apparently being championed as the first ever
information technologist.
Ahem. Excuse me? Aristotle? Plato? Galen? Pliny? Plutarch? Oh, sorry, they don't count. Heathens, you see. Best thing to do would be to have all the little brown buggers shot. (Or burned at the stake, which is probably a little more culturally apposite.) Of course, Alan Turing's out, because he was gay, and apparently Ada Lovelace was a bit of a bad girl. And, of course, none of these eminent chaps (and one chapess) have been canonised.
To me this smacks more than a little of jobs for the boys. Not to underrate St Isidore's contribution to broadening the fount of human knowledge, but there are a million better choices out there who have done more for "internet users and computer programmmers" who just happen to have been non-Christian.
Surely the internet is all about getting on with people all over the world regardless of race, colour or -- especially -- creed. (It's either that or flamage, and I would prefer to think it's the former, anyway.)