Is the pope a reactionary or a prophet?

Guardian ^ | March 23, 2010 | John Hooper

[NYer]

Under an all-but-full moon on the opening evening of the Second Vatican Council in 1962, tens of thousands of Romans poured into St Peter's Square in a torchlight procession. Called to the window of his study by the multitude, John XXIII, the man Italians called "the good pope" (a term that speaks volumes about their view of the previous 260), delivered one of the great speeches of an eloquent decade. Its emotional high point came when he told the crowd: "Returning home, you'll find the children. Give your children a caress and say: 'This is the caress of the pope.'"

Forty-three years later, on the night Benedict XVI was elected, a text message hurtled between mobiles as the crowds dispersed from that same square. "Returning home, you'll find the children", it read. "Give them a belt round the ear and say: 'That's a belt round the ear from the pope.'"

In the five years since, it has become clear that the daunting reputation the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger brought into office as "God's rottweiler" was, in many respects, misleading. A man less likely to cuff a child would be hard to imagine – although, as the latest and biggest scandal to rock his papacy has revealed, his choirmaster brother was not above cuffing choristers.

On Saturday, Benedict tried to put the lid on that scandal with a letter to the Catholics of Ireland apologising for the "sinful and criminal" abuses of children whose disclosure has rocked the Irish church to its foundations and helped bring down a Dublin government. Using language rarely heard from popes, whose utterances on some issues are held by Catholics to be infallible, he said he was "truly sorry" for what had happened over a period of decades.

[NYer]

Benedict XVI is facing the biggest crisis of his reign as pope. Photograph: VINCENZO PINTO/AFP

The idea that today's Catholic church – hostile to abortion and contraception, antipathetic to homosexuality and dismissive of the idea of women priests – might be a bastion of enlightened values is one many Britons will find hard to accept. But then it is difficult to think of a society that provides Benedict with a greater challenge to his ideas than multicultural Britain, with its anti-discriminatory ethos and increasingly vociferous atheist minority. The growing popularity of writers such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and AC Grayling, who argue that religion is not just irrelevant but pernicious, is a key difference between the Britain that Benedict will find when he visits and the altogether more respectful one John Paul II experienced 28 years ago.

I hope they plan to outfit him with a bulletproof vest.

[BitWielder1]

Reactionary = Not Progressive.
That's a good thing.

[trisham]

No kidding.

[trisham]

I really like that photo, btw. Prayers for our beloved Pope Benedict.

[SevenofNine]

Is me or what does that of the Pope remind me of Michael Corlone in that dark room in Godfather 3

[Dajjal]

Pope John Paul II refused and Pope Benedict XVI refuses to admit that the true scandal is not that there were some individual sinful priests -- the true scandal is that there was the collaborative coverup and the reassignment of those priests by the bishops!

The evidence is growing that Bishop Ratzinger was one of those bishops.

Is the pope a reactionary or a prophet?

I still tend to think of him as a liberal, pro-Vatican-Two, Patristico-Rahnerean Phenomenologist.

[trisham]

I tend to think of him as a future saint.

[Tublecane]

“Is the pope a reactionary or a prophet?”

Can’t one be both?

[TASMANIANRED]

Anyone that holds to an absolute standard is held in contempt.

[Clemenza]

I consider him a placeholder/theology professor who doesn’t compare to his great predecessor.

[circlecity]

The viciousness with which the media is going after him convinces me you Catholics picked the right person for the job. Although he sometimes drives me crazy (global warming, immigration), on the key stuff he’s a rock. “All who desie to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.”

[trisham]

So it seems.

[trisham]

Very astute. Thanks, cc.

[TASMANIANRED]

One of the problems of now is....The Catholic Church stands as she has always stood...many others have run towards liberalism, socialism and moral equivalency.

They point at the church and decry her absolute values, her holding to truth and say how she has moved to the right wing.

They have moved, not the Church.

[trisham]

Well said!

[NYer]

Anyone that holds to an absolute standard is held in contempt.

Bingo!

The Catholic Church is an easy target because it is the only religious body with a central authority figure. Non-Catholic christian denominations lack any centralized authority, as does Judaism and Islam. They are broken down into sects.

There is a good reason why the pope wears red shoes.

[trisham]

I love the red shoes!

[Tax-chick]

We’re probably supposed to think he looks sinister, but I think he looks like he needs a hug, a glass of wine, and a big Cuban dinner!

[Tax-chick]

"Returning home, you'll find the children ...

Not anymore. Italy's birthrate is in the running for lowest-low in dying Europe.