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POPE BENEDICT'S SUCCESS IS DOWN TO PRIORITIES, STYLE AND CONTENT
By Ronan Mullen
Irish Examiner, Ireland
April 5 2006
LAST Sunday's gatherings in Rome, Poland and elsewhere to mark the
first anniversary of Pope John Paul's death were exactly what you
would have expected: big, atmospheric, emotional events.
The memory of a great man lives among his followers, in the Church
and the world. No surprise there.
The big surprise is the man who now sits on the Chair of Peter. It is
almost a year since the world greeted the news of a Ratzinger papacy
with some trepidation. What had the cardinals done, many wondered at
the time.
How could the man known for so long as the 'enforcer' follow the
charismatic John Paul? The clue was in the question, of course. By
the time he died, Pope John Paul had won a place in all but the most
obdurate of hearts. But he had plenty of critics throughout his papacy,
particularly in the west.
In hindsight, it seems obvious that the cardinals were looking for
someone who would not buckle under the weight of his predecessor's
legacy.
They needed a man with a character and style of his own, who could
address the challenges of the age. And so they chose Ratzinger.
Time seems to have proven them right. Consider this hard-to-believe
statistic: the number of people attending the new Pope's liturgies
and preaching is running at double the turnout for Pope John Paul's
gatherings.
No doubt, this is partly due to the novelty factor and also to the
wave of interest and goodwill generated by Pope John Paul's death
and its dramatic aftermath. But there seems to be something else.
Benedict is interesting people.
His success, so far, is down to three things: priorities, style
and content.
First, priorities. Nowhere is the radical nature of his agenda
more apparent than in his first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est (God
Is Love). As US commentator George Weigel put it, those who bought
into the notion of Joseph Ratzinger as 'God's rottweiler', obsessed
with morality and doctrine, might have expected a document called
'No You Don't'.
Instead, they got a 60-page meditation on the central notion of the
Christian faith - the claim that 'God is Love'. You might think it
rather daring, to say the least, for him to expound on erotic love
when so many people think the Church should shut up about such matters.
But as Benedict sees it, you can't explain the Church's vision of
the universe, or its teachings on moral and social issues, without
first reflecting deeply on the nature of love - human and divine.
Benedict teaches that God's relationship with the world is best
understood as a love story, not as a relationship of power or a clash
of wills. With the birth of Jesus Christ, God comes into history in
search of man, desiring to draw people into a community of love.
As God's love enters more deeply into people's lives, he writes,
"self-abandonment to God increases and God becomes our joy".
His open style is noteworthy too. One of the more engaging features of
his pontificate is a willingness to discard the script and launch into
dialogue with his audience. At the beginning of Lent, it is traditional
for the Pope to meet with the priests of his diocese in Rome.
This year, Benedict departed from the prepared text and responded
spontaneously to questions the priests posed, on a variety of
issues from the role of women in the Church to relationship between
Christianity and Islam. In the same spirit of dialogue, he granted
an early meeting to long-time Church dissenter Hans Kung, to the
surprise of many commentators and critics.
His third strength is in the quality of his content. At his first Mass
in St John Lateran, the cathedral of the Bishop of Rome, he made it
clear that he was not out to promote his own personal viewpoints.
The Pope "must not proclaim his own ideas", he declared, "but rather
constantly bind himself and the Church to obedience to God's Word,
in the face of every attempt to adapt it or water it down, and every
form of opportunism".
Having established the boundaries of his remit, the new Pope then
proved himself quite willing to discuss the hard questions, and
even consider the possibility of change. For example, he raised
the difficult question of the Church's ministry to people in second
unions. And while confirming the Church's traditional belief that
the Lord has reserved priestly ministry for men, he declared it
"right to wonder if even in ministerial service ... more room and
more positions of responsibility might be offered to women".
IN THE world of politics, it is frequently the case that the supposed
hardliners are the ones most capable of leading their people through
a process of change.
There may be a parallel with Pope Benedict.
He is, of course, classically conservative in that he will protect the
traditions and teaching of the Church. But as one of the world's finest
theologians, he may also discern where progress is desirable in the
light of the developing tradition of the Church, and come up with some
surprisingly radical responses to some of the challenges of the times.
In the end, his most attractive quality is probably the very thing
that many people feared in the past - his German directness. Keen to
promote good relations with China, the new Pope nevertheless put down
a strong marker with the appointment of Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, bishop of
Hong Kong, as cardinal. Progress in the Church's relations with China?
Yes. But human rights and freedom of religion for its people are the
necessary prerequisite.
It's the same with Turkey. Benedict will visit Istanbul in November,
at the invitation of the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople,
Bartholomew I, and the Ankara government. But not for Ratzinger the
softly-softly diplomacy that characterises Irish, British and other
government utterances before their trade missions to dodgy regimes.
At the Vatican recently, Benedict recalled the 'great evil' of the
slaughter of the Armenians, suffered by them in the name of the
Christian faith. To even mention this massacre is a crime in Turkey.
The latest issue of La Civilta Cattolica, a Jesuit magazine known to
be vetted and approved by the Vatican, gives a positive assessment of
politically moderate Islam currently in power in Turkey but denounces
the lack of religious freedom afflicting the Christian minorities in
Turkey today.
Again, the full implementation of religious liberty is a necessary
condition, the Holy See believes, for the eventual admission of Turkey
to the EU.
Straight talking but open to dialogue. That's the Benedict style.
Perhaps it is still too early to say whether this Pope will live on
in people's affections the way his predecessor has done. But this is
no interregnum papacy. Benedict has set about making his own unique
contribution to the history of the Catholic Church. At the age of 79,
perhaps the only thing against him is time.
By Ronan Mullen
Irish Examiner, Ireland
April 5 2006
LAST Sunday's gatherings in Rome, Poland and elsewhere to mark the
first anniversary of Pope John Paul's death were exactly what you
would have expected: big, atmospheric, emotional events.
The memory of a great man lives among his followers, in the Church
and the world. No surprise there.
The big surprise is the man who now sits on the Chair of Peter. It is
almost a year since the world greeted the news of a Ratzinger papacy
with some trepidation. What had the cardinals done, many wondered at
the time.
How could the man known for so long as the 'enforcer' follow the
charismatic John Paul? The clue was in the question, of course. By
the time he died, Pope John Paul had won a place in all but the most
obdurate of hearts. But he had plenty of critics throughout his papacy,
particularly in the west.
In hindsight, it seems obvious that the cardinals were looking for
someone who would not buckle under the weight of his predecessor's
legacy.
They needed a man with a character and style of his own, who could
address the challenges of the age. And so they chose Ratzinger.
Time seems to have proven them right. Consider this hard-to-believe
statistic: the number of people attending the new Pope's liturgies
and preaching is running at double the turnout for Pope John Paul's
gatherings.
No doubt, this is partly due to the novelty factor and also to the
wave of interest and goodwill generated by Pope John Paul's death
and its dramatic aftermath. But there seems to be something else.
Benedict is interesting people.
His success, so far, is down to three things: priorities, style
and content.
First, priorities. Nowhere is the radical nature of his agenda
more apparent than in his first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est (God
Is Love). As US commentator George Weigel put it, those who bought
into the notion of Joseph Ratzinger as 'God's rottweiler', obsessed
with morality and doctrine, might have expected a document called
'No You Don't'.
Instead, they got a 60-page meditation on the central notion of the
Christian faith - the claim that 'God is Love'. You might think it
rather daring, to say the least, for him to expound on erotic love
when so many people think the Church should shut up about such matters.
But as Benedict sees it, you can't explain the Church's vision of
the universe, or its teachings on moral and social issues, without
first reflecting deeply on the nature of love - human and divine.
Benedict teaches that God's relationship with the world is best
understood as a love story, not as a relationship of power or a clash
of wills. With the birth of Jesus Christ, God comes into history in
search of man, desiring to draw people into a community of love.
As God's love enters more deeply into people's lives, he writes,
"self-abandonment to God increases and God becomes our joy".
His open style is noteworthy too. One of the more engaging features of
his pontificate is a willingness to discard the script and launch into
dialogue with his audience. At the beginning of Lent, it is traditional
for the Pope to meet with the priests of his diocese in Rome.
This year, Benedict departed from the prepared text and responded
spontaneously to questions the priests posed, on a variety of
issues from the role of women in the Church to relationship between
Christianity and Islam. In the same spirit of dialogue, he granted
an early meeting to long-time Church dissenter Hans Kung, to the
surprise of many commentators and critics.
His third strength is in the quality of his content. At his first Mass
in St John Lateran, the cathedral of the Bishop of Rome, he made it
clear that he was not out to promote his own personal viewpoints.
The Pope "must not proclaim his own ideas", he declared, "but rather
constantly bind himself and the Church to obedience to God's Word,
in the face of every attempt to adapt it or water it down, and every
form of opportunism".
Having established the boundaries of his remit, the new Pope then
proved himself quite willing to discuss the hard questions, and
even consider the possibility of change. For example, he raised
the difficult question of the Church's ministry to people in second
unions. And while confirming the Church's traditional belief that
the Lord has reserved priestly ministry for men, he declared it
"right to wonder if even in ministerial service ... more room and
more positions of responsibility might be offered to women".
IN THE world of politics, it is frequently the case that the supposed
hardliners are the ones most capable of leading their people through
a process of change.
There may be a parallel with Pope Benedict.
He is, of course, classically conservative in that he will protect the
traditions and teaching of the Church. But as one of the world's finest
theologians, he may also discern where progress is desirable in the
light of the developing tradition of the Church, and come up with some
surprisingly radical responses to some of the challenges of the times.
In the end, his most attractive quality is probably the very thing
that many people feared in the past - his German directness. Keen to
promote good relations with China, the new Pope nevertheless put down
a strong marker with the appointment of Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, bishop of
Hong Kong, as cardinal. Progress in the Church's relations with China?
Yes. But human rights and freedom of religion for its people are the
necessary prerequisite.
It's the same with Turkey. Benedict will visit Istanbul in November,
at the invitation of the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople,
Bartholomew I, and the Ankara government. But not for Ratzinger the
softly-softly diplomacy that characterises Irish, British and other
government utterances before their trade missions to dodgy regimes.
At the Vatican recently, Benedict recalled the 'great evil' of the
slaughter of the Armenians, suffered by them in the name of the
Christian faith. To even mention this massacre is a crime in Turkey.
The latest issue of La Civilta Cattolica, a Jesuit magazine known to
be vetted and approved by the Vatican, gives a positive assessment of
politically moderate Islam currently in power in Turkey but denounces
the lack of religious freedom afflicting the Christian minorities in
Turkey today.
Again, the full implementation of religious liberty is a necessary
condition, the Holy See believes, for the eventual admission of Turkey
to the EU.
Straight talking but open to dialogue. That's the Benedict style.
Perhaps it is still too early to say whether this Pope will live on
in people's affections the way his predecessor has done. But this is
no interregnum papacy. Benedict has set about making his own unique
contribution to the history of the Catholic Church. At the age of 79,
perhaps the only thing against him is time.