sure, she has that "i'm a columnist" condescension running through parts of the piece, but this is great (emphasis mine):

"I read of this new Pope, the one who blue-skies in public and makes silly, ill-considered remarks about Islam and apologizes, only to insult Jews in the next breath. This leads to ponderous BBC backgrounders asking: 'How infallible is the Pope?' But to an atheist, you’re either infallible or not. By apologizing, he proved himself fallible. Does this mean he has to resign?

The BBC says no. Apparently the Pope only speaks infallibly when he announces ahead of time that he’s going to. This is the journalistic equivalent of 'going on the record.'

Also, and I could have told the Pope this, never quote anyone from the 14th century. With the exception of Chaucer, people weren’t at their brightest then. Things didn’t perk up intellectually until the Renaissance. And one word reverberates: Crusades. Blood. Axes. Spikes. Takes two to go on a crusade, and I mean you, Pope Urban II.

As for the Pope pointing out that worshipping the cross was really worshipping the Jewish tool of execution of Christ, it only made this atheist think of that Lenny Bruce line about how if Jesus had been killed 20 years ago, Catholic school children would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses.

And all of the above reveal the problem suffered by people like me when the world’s religious types get upset. Devoid of religious belief or interest, I don’t have the faintest idea what people are angry about. Atheists don’t get it. The only joy in these disputes is one I share with the British writer Marina Hyde: She loves to see mad placards in demonstrations. Her favourite was the American soccer mom who had embroidered 'God Hates Fags' on the Confederate flag."

see, she doesn't mean "atheists don't get it" in the way some centrist american pundit would chide more liberal elements for disrespecting the jesus magic of the heartland. it's more about the insane saturation of our news with religious viewpoints and how, if we didn't live through it daily, we would really be confused about why-- but we are anyway. seriously, what happened/is happening? i'm no atheist, but organised religion on the world stage at this day and age should make anyone remotely reasonable very uncomfortable.