[Paleopsych] Benedict XVI Package
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Here's a whole bunch of articles, mostly from the New York Times and wire
services picked up by the NYT. The view I'd most like to get is that of
David Sloan Wilson, the champion of group selection in biology in _Unto
Others_ (co-authored with Elliott Sober) and, more recently, of
functionalism in religion in _Darwin's Cathedral_. He once called himself
"an atheist, but a nice atheist" and holds that religions (at least those
that have survived) have on the whole done good. (I'm still dubious.) He
has dealt with the apparently odd fact that stricter religions attract
more adherents, and Benedict may indeed make Catholicism more strict.
We shall see. Watch for increased competition for strictness from
Protestants and Mormons. The ethnic angle should we watched carefully.
Though Roman Catholicism no longer has a White majority, this is the first
time that the possibility of a non-White pope has been broached. It is
taboo for Europeans to rejoice in winning the ethnic competition; instead
look for an increase in the numbers of European Roman Catholics, or at
least a slowing in their erosion.
I'll provide more coverage tomorrow. I a single commentator says anything
you could not have predicted, let me know at once!
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The New York Times > International > International Special > In St.
Peter's, Concerns Over His Doctrine
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20pope.html
April 20, 2005
By IAN FISHER
VATICAN CITY, April 19 - Roman Catholic cardinals reached to the
church's conservative wing on Tuesday and chose as the 265th pope
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, a seasoned and hard-line German theologian
who served as John Paul II's defender of the faith.
At 5:50 p.m. in Rome, wispy white smoke puffed from the chimney above
the Sistine Chapel where the cardinals were meeting, signaling that
the new pope had been chosen, only a day after the secret conclave
began. His name was not announced until nearly an hour later, after
the great bell at St. Peter's tolled, and the scarlet curtain over the
basilica's central balcony parted and a cardinal stepped out to
announce in Latin, "Habemus papam!"
"Dear brothers and sisters," Cardinal Ratzinger, 78, said, speaking
Italian in a clear voice, spreading his arms wide over the crowd from
the balcony. "After the great Pope John Paul II, the cardinals have
elected me, a simple, humble worker in the Lord's vineyard." He
announced his name as Benedict XVI.
The unusually brief conclave seemed to suggest that Cardinal Ratzinger
was a popular choice inside the college of 115 cardinals who elected
him as a man who shared - if at times went beyond - John Paul's
conservative theology and seemed ready to take over the job after
serving beside him for more than two decades.
It was not clear, however, how popular a choice he was on St. Peter's
Square. The applause for the new pope, while genuine and sustained
among many, tapered off decisively in large pockets, which some
assembled there said reflected their reservations about his doctrinal
rigidity and whether, under Benedict XVI, an already polarized church
will now find less to bind it together.
"I kind of do think he will try to unite Catholics," said Linda
Nguyen, 20, an American student studying in Rome who had wrapped six
rosaries around her hands. "But he might scare people away."
Vincenzo Jammace, a teacher from Rome, stood up on a plastic chair
below the balcony and intoned, "This is the gravest error!"
Pope Benedict's well-known stands include the assertion that
Catholicism is "true" and other religions are "deficient"; that the
modern, secular world, especially in Europe, is spiritually weak; and
that Catholicism is in competition with Islam. He has also strongly
opposed homosexuality, women as priests and stem cell research.
His many supporters said they believed that the rule of Benedict XVI -
a scholar who reportedly speaks 10 languages, including excellent
English - would be clear and uncompromising about what it means to be
a Roman Catholic.
"It would be more popular to be more liberal, but it's not the best
way for the church," said Martin Sturm, 20, a student from Germany.
"The church must tell the truth, even if it is not what the people
want to hear. And he will tell the truth."
While Pope Benedict's views are upsetting to many Catholics in Europe
and among liberal Americans, they are likely to find a receptive
audience among the young and conservative Catholics whom John Paul II
energized. His conservatism on moral issues may also play well in
developing countries, where the church is growing rapidly, but where
issues of poverty and social justice are also important. It is unclear
how much Cardinal Ratzinger, a man with limited pastoral experience,
and that spent in rich Europe, will speak to those concerns.
Born on April 16, 1927, in Marktl am Inn, in Bavaria, he was the son
of a police officer. He was ordained in 1951, at age 24. He began his
career as a liberal academic and theological adviser to at the Second
Vatican Council, supporting many efforts to make the church more open.
But he moved theologically and politically to the right. Pope Paul VI
appointed him bishop of Munich in 1977 and appointed him cardinal in
just three months. Taking the chief doctrinal job in 1981, he moved
with vigor to squash liberation theology in Latin America, cracked
down on liberal theologians and in 2000 wrote the contentious Vatican
document "Dominus Jesus," asserting the truth of the Catholic belief
over others.
Despite views his opponents consider harsh, he is said to be shy and
charming in private, a deeply spiritual and meditative man who lives
simply. "He's very delicate, refined, respectful," Cardinal Fiorenzo
Angelini, a retired top Vatican official who had worked closely with
Cardinal Ratzinger, said in an interview on Tuesday night. "He's very
approachable. He's open to everyone."
With their choice, cardinals from 52 countries definitively answered
several questions about the direction of the Roman Catholic Church at
the start of its third millennium.
They did not reach outside Europe, perhaps to Latin America, as many
Vatican watchers expected, to reflect the growth of the church there
and in Asia and Africa, prompting some disappointed reactions from
Latin America on Tuesday. They did not choose a candidate with long
experience as a pastor, but an academic and Vatican insider. They did
not return the job to Italy, which had held the papacy for 455 years
before a Pole, Karol Wojtyla, was elected John Paul II in 1978.
They also did not chose a man as young as John Paul II, who was only
58 when elected. Cardinal Ratzinger turned 78 last Saturday, the
oldest pope chosen since Clement XII in 1730. This has led to some
speculation that cardinals chose him as a trusted, transitional
figure.
John Paul was virtually unknown when he was selected, but Cardinal
Ratzinger's record is long and articulate in a prolific academic
career, followed by a contentious tenure as John Paul's doctrinal
watchdog. Most cardinals know him well from visits to Rome, and he won
admiration among many colleagues for his crucial role in administering
the church in the last stages of John Paul's illness.
In many ways, the cardinals picked John Paul's theological twin but
his opposite in presence and personality. Where John Paul was
charismatic and tended to soften his rigid stands with human warmth,
Cardinal Ratzinger is bland in public and pulls few punches about his
beliefs.
President Bush on Tuesday recalled the cardinal's homily at John
Paul's funeral, saying, "His words touched our hearts and the hearts
of millions." Speaking in Washington, he called Benedict a "man of
great wisdom and knowledge."
Only on Monday, as the cardinals attended a Mass before locking
themselves inside the Sistine Chapel to select a new pope, Cardinal
Ratzinger took a moment as dean of the college of cardinals and
celebrant of the Mass to repeat his fears about threats to the faith.
In retrospect, some observers said, he was laying out what may be the
focus of his papacy.
"Having a clear faith, based on the creed of the church, is often
labeled today as fundamentalism," he said at the Mass. "Whereas
relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and 'swept along by
every wind of teaching,' looks like the only attitude acceptable to
today's standards."
Cardinal Ratzinger has often criticized religious relativism, the
belief - mistaken, he says - that all beliefs are equally true.
"We are moving toward a dictatorship of relativism which does not
recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal
one's own ego and one's own desires," he added.
In his brief, first address as Benedict XVI on Tuesday from the
balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, he did not speak of theology or of a
specific direction for the church.
"I am comforted by the fact that the Lord knows how to work and act
even with insufficient instruments," he said. "And above all, I
entrust myself to your prayers."
Benedict XVI had dinner on Tuesday night with the other cardinals at
the Santa Marta residence, built by John Paul II to provide more
comfortable lodgings for cardinals while locked down in the conclave,
said Joaquín Navarro-Valls, the chief Vatican spokesman.
He is to be installed in a Mass at St. Peter's Basilica on Sunday.
The conclave that selected him on the fourth ballot was among the
shortest of the last century - the shortest, the election of Pius XII
in 1939, took only three - and the speed caught many experts by
surprise. Cardinal Ratzinger has been a divisive figure within the
church, and reports before the conclave spoke almost unanimously about
blocs of more progressive cardinals lining up against him.
In theory, cardinals are not allowed to discuss the inner workings of
the conclave, but in reality, details seep out later. Several
cardinals are expected to give interviews or news conferences on
Wednesday, and may provide some limited glimpses in the dynamic that
picked Cardinal Ratzinger - and with such speed.
But already, there was at least one voice of careful reservation.
Cardinal Godfried Danneels of Belgium, one of the most liberal
cardinals, who has been critical of Cardinal Ratzinger, skipped the
dinner specifically to hold a news conference.
He would not disclose his own vote and did not criticize Cardinal
Ratzinger directly. But he was not effusive in his praise, either,
saying that he had "a certain hope" based on the choice of the name
Benedict. Benedict XV, who appealed for peace during World War I, "was
a man of peace and reconciliation," Cardinal Danneels said.
But, he said, "We have to see what's in a name."
He also warned that being the spiritual leader of one billion Roman
Catholics was different from parsing out theological matters.
"When you are a pope, you have to be the pastor of every one and
everything which happens in the church," he said. "You are not
specialized."
But Cardinal Edward M. Egan, archbishop of New York, said Tuesday that
the process involved a "certain amount of tension and concern" but
that the conclave made the right choice.
"I believe that the Lord has something to do with it," Cardinal Egan
said at a news conference here. "This man is going to do a splendid
job."
Asked if Cardinal Ratzinger would adopt a harsher tone as pope,
Cardinal Egan asked a reporter: "Why don't you and I get together in
one year and we'll talk about it. I have every hope that the tone is
going to be the one of Jesus Christ."
Elisabetta Povoledo of The International Herald Tribune and Jason
Horowitz contributed reporting for this article.
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The New York Times > International > International Special > News
Analysis: An Evangelizer on the Right, With His Eye on the Future
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20assess.html
An Evangelizer on the Right, With His Eye on the Future
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
VATICAN CITY, April 19 - Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was such a close
ally of Pope John Paul II that he could have easily chosen the name
John Paul III.
But those who expect the 78-year-old Pope Benedict XVI simply to
follow in the footsteps of his predecessor may be in for a surprise,
say those who know him. They say that he knows he may have a short
papacy and that he intends to move quickly to put his own stamp on the
Roman Catholic Church and to reverse its decline in the secular West.
As John Paul's alter ego, the new German pope has been training for
this role for decades and knows how all the levers of Vatican power
work.
"This man is not just going to mind the store," said George Weigel, a
conservative American scholar who knows both the former and new popes.
"He is going to take re-evangelization, especially of Europe, very
seriously. I think this represents a recognition on the part of the
cardinals that the great battle in the world remains inside the heads
of human beings - that it's a battle of ideas."
Sandro Magister, a Vatican expert at the Italian magazine L'Espresso,
said he expected a thorough housecleaning not unlike the Gregorian
reforms of the church begun under Pope Gregory VII, who ruled from
1073 to 1085. Those reforms led to the end of both the married clergy
and the buying and selling of spiritual favors like indulgences.
Cardinal Ratzinger had spoken and written forcefully about his sense
of the threats to the church, both internal and external. Whether they
are dissident theologians, pedophile priests, "cafeteria Catholics"
who disregard the ban on artificial birth control, or "celibate" third
world clergy who keep mistresses, the new pope's solution is likely to
be a more forceful reiteration of the church's creed and the necessity
of either living by it, or leaving it.
"How much filth there is in the church, even among those who, in the
priesthood, should belong entirely" to God, he said in Rome on Good
Friday last month.
He has singled out the spread of "aggressive secularism," especially
in Europe and North America. In the homily he gave Monday, just before
the cardinals entered the conclave in which he was chosen, he warned
about rival forms of belief, from "a vague religious mysticism" to
"syncretism" to "new sects," a term that Catholics in Latin America
use to refer to evangelical and Pentecostal churches.
The new pope is not likely to yield on the primacy of the Roman
Catholic Church, whether dealing with other Christian denominations or
Islam. In a document issued in 2000, "Dominus Jesus," the Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith that Cardinal Ratzinger headed said the
Catholic Church was the only true path to salvation and called other
faiths "gravely deficient."
In choosing the name Benedict, this German theologian linked himself
not only to a long line of former popes but also to St. Benedict, the
founder of Christian monasticism, who was proclaimed by Pope Paul VI
in 1964 to be the "patron and protector of Europe." The monasteries
that St. Benedict founded - and for which he wrote the "Rule," the
basic guide to monastic living - became the keepers of culture and
piety in medieval Europe.
Church scholars suggested that Pope Benedict XVI may be positioning
himself as the new savior of Europe, rescuing the Continent from what
he called in his homily on Monday "the dictatorship of relativism."
Cardinal Justin Francis Rigali, the archbishop of Philadelphia, said
of the new pope at a news conference on Tuesday, "He intends to do
everything he possibly can to promote the well-being of Europe,"
adding that what the Continent most needs is "to prefer nothing to the
love of Christ - Christocentrality."
Jim McAdams, professor of political science and director of the
Nanovic Institute for European Studies at Notre Dame University, said
the new pope's form of conservatism should not be conflated with that
of American political conservatives. Faith, he said, "is essential to
his claims that there is a doctrine of the church, it is clear,
Catholics should abide by it, and people who feel that that doctrine
is negotiable are wrong."
The selection of Cardinal Ratzinger dashed the hopes of those
Catholics who had wanted a new pope to adopt a whole slate of
different solutions to the problems of the church, perhaps permitting
married priests, women as deacons and softer strictures against birth
control and divorce.
"The election of a new pope is a moment of hope for the church, and
this choice is nothing but backwards looking," said Paul F. Lakeland,
a professor of religious studies at Fairfield University in
Connecticut.
Cardinal Ratzinger functioned for years as the purifier of the
church's doctrine. For 24 years he headed the Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, from which he issued condemnations of renegade
theologians, of modern reinterpretations of church liturgy and of the
idea that all religions have an equal claim to the truth.
In recent years, as John Paul grew more and more debilitated by
Parkinson's disease and old age, Cardinal Ratzinger increasingly
became the power behind the throne. Bishops from every country who
visit the Vatican on their regular visits spent more time with him
than they did with the pope, according to cardinals and Vatican staff.
It may have been this familiarity that led the cardinals to turn to
Cardinal Ratzinger as their anchor in this time of transition. The
Rev. Joseph Augustine Di Noia, an American priest who serves as under
secretary at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, told
reporters last week that he often observed the cardinal listening
intently to bishops on their visits presenting him with all kinds of
conundrums on how to apply the faith in their countries. Cardinal
Ratzinger would respond with "remarkable profundity" and "distinctions
that are immediately illuminating," Father Di Noia said.
But it is already clear that the new pope is likely to deepen the
fissures that exist in the church. The reactions from the crowd in the
first few minutes after Pope Benedict appeared on the balcony
overlooking St. Peter's Square suggested the divisions he will have to
confront.
"As soon as I heard the name, I had a letdown, sinking feeling that
this man is not going to be good for the church," said Eileen, a
53-year-old Catholic from Boston. She said she was afraid to give her
last name because she was active in her parish and did not want to
cause any problems for her priest, or jeopardize her daughter's
imminent church wedding.
A few steps away, the Rev. M. Price Oswalt, a priest who serves two
parishes in Oklahoma City, was exultant about the cardinals' choice.
"He'll correct the lackadaisical attitudes that have been able to
creep into the lives of Catholics," he said. "He's going to have a
German mentality of leadership: either get on the train or get off the
track. He will not put up with rebellious children."
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20crowd.html
April 20, 2005
Crowd's Praise Tinged With Questions About Pope's Conservatism
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
International Herald Tribune
VATICAN CITY, April 19 - When the great bell of St. Peter's finally
rang to confirm that a new pope had been chosen, just after 6 p.m., it
seemed that all of Rome ran to the Vatican to see who would appear on
the balcony of the basilica.
With the bell, Via Della Conciliazione, the boulevard leading to St.
Peter's Square, was transformed into a strange kind of work-day
marathon, choked with runners in business suits lugging briefcases and
young mothers pushing strollers along the stones.
"The whole building emptied and we just moved as fast as we could,
risking a heart attack," Giovanni Simeone, an architect, said, still
panting. Patrizia Maglie, a co-worker, said, "The only thing that
makes Romans run this way is a new pope - or a soccer match."
Many were relieved that they had made it in time, after watching with
uncertainty as the smoke rising from the Sistine Chapel chimney gave
confusing signals for 10 minutes on their television screens - seeming
to blow white, then grey, then white again. The many networks that had
had their cameras trained on the chimney since Monday were at a loss
to interpret what they saw.
CNN called the smoke black (no new pope), while ANSA, the Italian news
agency, called it white (new pope elected). The crowd that had decided
to wait out the election in St. Peter's Square alternately cheered and
stood silently in confusion, as the mixed signals poured out against
the unhelpful gray sky of a drizzly evening.
But then, the bell's clarifying ring cut through the confusion - and
thousands of Romans took off. It had been the specific order of Pope
John Paul II that a bell be added to the traditional announcement to
clarify the smoke's sometimes ambiguous message - an important
posthumous intervention, it turned out.
Forty minutes after the first sign of the late afternoon smoke, the
tens of thousands who had answered the bell's call shouted, "Bravo!
Bravo!" in response to the announcement from the basilica's balcony by
Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estévez that a new pope had been chosen.
But the reaction was decidedly mixed when the name Cardinal Joseph
Ratzinger was announced. Some slapped the air and shouted jubilantly.
Some stood by silently and listened. Some even shook their heads. A
small number of people wandered out of the square, as if in protest,
when the new pope spoke.
Those who supported the election of Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope
Benedict XVI, tended to see him as a force of continuity with his
popular predecessor, John Paul II, even if they were not too enamored
or familiar with the new pope himself.
"I'm happy because I respect the ideas and ideals of the previous
pope, and I think he'll continue just like the old one," said Alberto
Napoleone of Rome.
Indeed, the most powerful reaction during the new pope's short speech
came when he mentioned John Paul II's name, to a chorus of
enthusiastic whoops and cheers. The reception for Benedict XVI himself
seemed more measured.
"This is certainly the most conventional choice, and I would have
liked to see more a break with tradition," shrugged Simona Corso, a
university teacher in Rome, who said she would have preferred the
election of someone from Africa or Latin America.
But afterward, some well-known Italian conservatives strode through
the crowd with new confidence, clearly overjoyed with the turn that
history had taken.
"Before, we felt like orphans, but now again we have someone we can
look to!" said Rocco Buttiglione, an Italian government minister whose
appointment to the European Commission was rejected last year after he
called homosexuality a sin.
He said he was thrilled with a choice that he saw as bringing the
church back to its core moral teachings. Calling the new pope "the
greatest living theologian and one of the greatest intellectuals of
Central Europe," Mr. Buttiglione said Cardinal Ratzinger had been the
"point of reference" in his own intellectual development.
But others in the crowd were openly distressed. "I am very, very upset
because I was hoping for a more open pope, one who was more open to
the problems of the world, and also on things like women's rights,"
Paolo Tasselli, a retired bank official, said as he listened to the
new pope's speech.
He said he had loved Pope John Paul II, who he felt was conservative
on some issues but "open to the world" in other ways. He said of
Benedict XVI, "I don't think this new one can do that."
The crowds filed quickly and quietly out of the square after the new
pope's short speech - a marked contrast to the raucous pilgrims who
remained in St. Peter's for hours and days after John Paul II died,
even after he was finally buried.
Some here on Tuesday were tourists eager to partake of Rome's other
treats. "We were at the Pantheon, and when we heard the bells start
ringing and that there was a new Pope, we jumped in the first cab we
could find and somehow managed to get over here," said Shelly Charles
of Ogden, Utah. "It's been incredible to see history happen."
But most were Catholics who, as they shuffled back into their lives,
were hard-pressed to explain the silence that fell upon the square on
Tuesday night. Beloved John Paul was gone and uncertainty lay ahead.
It was partly the rain, but partly also the abrupt news of a new pope.
Many said they needed time to digest it all.
Elisabetta Povoledo of The International Herald Tribune contributed
reporting for this article.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20germany.html
April 20, 2005
New Pope's Birthplace Becomes a Center of Pride, With Muted Misgivings at
the Edges
By MARK LANDLER
MARKTL AM INN, Germany, April 19 - Here in the tiny birthplace of
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the townspeople turned out on Tuesday to
celebrate his ascension to the helm of the Roman Catholic Church in
genuine Bavarian style: with a thumping brass band and frothy glasses
of beer.
The simple get-together of 150 or so residents could not have been
more unlike the majestic ritual at the Vatican, where Cardinal
Ratzinger's election as Pope Benedict XVI was announced to the world.
Only the band members, in their felt hats and feathers, provided any
plumage.
But people here said their native son would have felt at home among
the police officers, carpenters, laborers and homemakers.
"He is a highly intelligent man, and kind, but he is also very
simple," said Joseph Gassner, 68, the director of a local museum. "He
is an old Bavarian, and we are happy that he will rule in Rome."
The son of a policeman, Joseph Ratzinger was born in this river town
on April 16, 1927. He lived in Marktl for only two years, before his
family moved to another village nearer the Austrian border. His
father's run-ins with local Nazi officials were said to have kept the
family on the move.
Still, Marktl seemed determined to stake its claim to the man who had
become the first pope of German ancestry in nearly 500 years.
Residents were eager to show visitors the house in which Cardinal
Ratzinger was born. It is a handsome building with a peaked roof and a
plaque next to the front door.
The windows were dark on Tuesday night, their lace curtains
illuminated by the glare of photographers' flashbulbs.
Mr. Gassner said Cardinal Ratzinger visited Marktl occasionally, and
in 1998 invited a delegation of 55 residents to visit Rome, where they
were his guests for dinner. He also arranged an audience with Pope
John Paul II.
"He has a strong connection to this place," Mr. Gassner said. "We're
in a part of Bavaria that is very Catholic."
While the mayor planned the party before any white smoke was spotted,
there was general astonishment here that Cardinal Ratzinger was
actually selected. Several people said they had expected the College
of Cardinals to choose a pope from Latin America or Africa. Others had
bet on an Italian.
Maria Spuderer, a 48-year-old homemaker, said she had goosebumps as
she waited to learn the identity of the new pope. "Our hearts said one
thing, but our heads said something else," she said.
In the joyful din here, there were few dissenting voices concerning
Cardinal Ratzinger or his conservative leanings. "The pope must set a
path for the church that he believes in," said Engelbert Feldner, 69,
the town's former brew master. "He can't bend with the times."
The Bavarian countryside is Germany's Catholic and conservative
heartland. Crucifixes can be found on the walls of classrooms here,
and the conservative Christian Social Union has ruled for four
decades. In other parts of Germany, where the politics are liberal and
loyalty to the church is weaker, feelings about Cardinal Ratzinger are
far more ambivalent.
"A lot of Germans dislike the way he developed as a theologian," said
Siegfried Wiedenhofer, a former student of Cardinal Ratzinger's who is
a professor of systematic theology at the University of Frankfurt.
"His criticism of his German colleagues created an atmosphere of
suspicion."
Some reformist Catholic groups reacted to Cardinal Ratzinger's
election with withering criticism.
"We think the election of Ratzinger is a catastrophe," said Bernd
Göhring , the head of a group called Church From Below, in remarks
reported by Reuters. "In the coming years there would be no reforms. I
think that now even more people will turn their back on the church."
Even in Munich, where he was archbishop, opinions were divided. While
respected as a scholar, he did not win a popular following during his
four years as archbishop and later a cardinal.
People there recalled Cardinal Ratzinger as an aloof figure. He was
known for communicating with the priests in his archdiocese through
letters. He did not like conflict, and shied away from personal
confrontation, according to people who knew him then.
At a requiem Mass for Pope John Paul II at the Munich cathedral two
weeks ago, there was little excitement that a hometown prelate was
mentioned among the leading candidates for pope.
"He would never be able to connect with young people like John Paul,"
said Christian Schuster, 35. "The pope had humility. Cardinal
Ratzinger has a different image. He is a very powerful man."
Other people interviewed outside the cathedral said Munich was proud
of its former bishop. Some also suggested he might confound
expectations that he will be doctrinaire and reactionary.
"In his Vatican job, he had to be hard-line," said Martin Holzner, 44.
"But as pope, he might take a different line."
Among the young people who turned out here, Cardinal Ratzinger's
intentions became grist for a lively debate. Rainer Buchmeier, 20,
said he was sure the new pope would preach in the same orthodox style
as John Paul II. Christof Six, 19, predicted a change in course.
Mostly, the young men were jubilant that a German had been chosen for
such a lofty office. "Germany in modern times has stood for war," Mr.
Buchmeier said. "Now we can start a new history."
Geography hangs heavily over Marktl. The town lies only a few miles
from Braunau, the Austrian border town where Hitler was born. Asked
whether he was relieved that his region would now be known for someone
else, Mr. Buchmeier offered a quick response.
"Braunau is Austria," he said. "Marktl is Germany."
---------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20jews.html
Jewish Groups Mostly Praise Pope as a Partner
By ANDY NEWMAN
Despite his wartime membership in the Hitler Youth movement, the
German now known as Pope Benedict XVI won strong praise from Jewish
leaders yesterday for his role in helping Pope John Paul II mend
fences between Catholics and Jews.
"I view him as our most serious partner in the Catholic Church, and he
has been for the last 26 years," said Rabbi Israel Singer, chairman of
the World Jewish Congress, which has led the fight for reparations for
Holocaust survivors as well as the Jewish community's dialogue with
the Vatican.
As head of the Vatican office that enforced church doctrine under John
Paul II, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was a leading force behind the
Vatican's recognition of Israel in 1993 and John Paul II's atonement
at the Western Wall in Jerusalem in 2000, Rabbi Singer said.
"I believe that he is the man who created the theological
underpinnings for the good relations between Catholics and Jews during
the last papacy," Rabbi Singer said. "He writes what's kosher and
what's not kosher for Catholics. He said, 'Not only is it kosher to
like Jews, but it's kosher to like the state of Israel.' "
In his memoirs, Cardinal Ratzinger wrote of being forced into the Nazi
youth movement when he was 14 in 1941, when membership was compulsory,
and of being drafted into the German Army in 1943.
"He's never denied the past, never hid it," said Abraham H. Foxman,
national director of the Anti-Defamation League. "His whole life has
been atonement for those few years. His whole life is an open book of
sensitivity against bigotry and anti-Semitism."
Mr. Foxman cited a column that Cardinal Ratzinger wrote for
L'Osservatore Romano in 2000 attacking Christian complicity in the
Holocaust. "It cannot be denied that a certain insufficient resistance
to this atrocity on the part of Christians can be explained by an
inherited anti-Judaism present in the hearts of not a few Christians,"
the cardinal wrote.
Mr. Foxman said that as a European of the World War II generation,
Cardinal Ratzinger would probably be more sensitive to Jewish concerns
than many other cardinals who were on the short list for the papacy.
Many others expressed similar thoughts.
"This pope, considering his historical experience, will be especially
committed to an uncompromising fight against anti-Semitism," Israel's
foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, said in a statement.
Rabbi David Rosen, the international director of interreligious
affairs for the American Jewish Committee, praised Cardinal
Ratzinger's elevation as "an obvious confirmation of the ideological
orientation of the previous papacy."
"I don't think there's one single issue on which the new pope will
depart from the previous pope," Rabbi Rosen said, "and that includes a
strong commitment to Catholic-Jewish relations."
Not surprisingly, more liberal Jews were less impressed with Cardinal
Ratzinger, who was the force behind a 2000 church document, "Dominus
Jesus," that called for new Catholic evangelization and argued that
beliefs other than Christianity were lesser searches for truth.
Rabbi Michael Lerner, the editor of the progressive Jewish magazine
Tikkun, wrote yesterday on the magazine's Web site that the cardinal's
criticism of other religions "is a slippery slope toward anti-Semitism
and a return to the chauvinistic and triumphalist views that led the
church, when it had the power to do so, to develop its infamous
crusades and inquisitions."
Greg Myre contributed reporting from Jerusalem for this article.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20american.html
For U.S. Catholics, a New Disagreement
By DEAN E. MURPHY
SAN FRANCISCO, April 19 - Roman Catholics poured into cathedrals and
parish churches across the United States on Tuesday to celebrate
Masses of Thanksgiving for the new pope, Benedict XVI, but the choice
of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as pope prompted strong disagreement over
what he would mean for the American church.
Some liberal Catholics and interest groups criticized the choice as a
lost opportunity to move the church in a less doctrinaire direction
because the new pope, a conservative German who was close to the late
John Paul II, has long held hard-line positions on many divisive
issues, including birth control, homosexuality and the ordination of
women. He has also suggested that a vote for a politician who supports
abortion rights could be sinful, and that American bishops should deny
such politicians Holy Communion.
With no less fervor, many conservative Catholics praised Benedict as a
strong leader whom they expected to shore up the church's teachings
and serve as a formidable steward of traditional values. Some
expressed hopes that the new pope would again require that Latin be
spoken at Mass.
Perhaps the only point not in contention was that at age 78, Benedict
was likely to have a much shorter papacy than John Paul, who was 58
when he was selected in 1978, and therefore less opportunity to leave
a lasting imprint.
"Who could follow an act like that?" said Valerie Lienau of Moraga,
Calif., who was among the 100 or so people who celebrated a
thanksgiving Mass at the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption in
San Francisco, the seat of the archdiocese here. "This gives people a
chance to catch their breath and absorb the legacy of Pope John Paul
II. The important thing is who will be the pope after Cardinal
Ratzinger."
Ms. Lienau, a self-described orthodox Catholic, said she was overjoyed
at the selection and drove 25 miles to San Francisco to mark the
occasion in the grandeur of the hilltop cathedral. But when she
excitedly phoned her son, who is gay, the response was a loud groan.
"I'm not blind to the challenges," Ms. Lienau said. "I'm very
sympathetic to the disappointment being felt."
R. Scott Appleby, a historian on American Catholicism at the
University of Notre Dame, said many Catholics were dismayed, stunned
and depressed at the selection of Cardinal Ratzinger.
"This is their worst nightmare come true," said Professor Appleby, who
predicted that the selection could lead to a "winnowing" of the
American church.
"There is an idea associated with Cardinal Ratzinger and some American
cardinals and bishops," Professor Appleby said, "that if we face a
choice as Catholics between a pure, doctrinally orthodox church on the
one hand and the current situation, which as they see it is a wide
range of practice and belief and a moral laxity, they would choose a
smaller, purer, more doctrinally orthodox church."
Others were more cautious about making predictions.
Msgr. Royale M. Vadakin, the vicar general of the Archdiocese of Los
Angeles, the nation's largest, said it was dangerous to assume that
Pope Benedict XVI would act the same as Cardinal Ratzinger. He said
that many popes had moved the church in surprising directions, and
that Cardinal Ratzinger might temper his strict views on church
teachings when confronted with the wider portfolio of the papacy.
"We now know the who - Cardinal Ratzinger," Monsignor Vadakin said,
speaking before the ornate doors of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the
Angels in Los Angeles. "The what is yet to unfold."
Some groups critical of the church's handling of sexually abusive
priests also said it was too early to draw conclusions. Suzanne Morse,
communications director for Voice of the Faithful, which advocates a
greater role for the laity in church governance, said that even when
the new pope was a cardinal, his views on the abuse scandal were
evolving.
Ms. Morse said that when the first accusations were made against
priests, Cardinal Ratzinger "seemed to think the problem was a media
creation." She added, "But since then, we have seen small but
significant signs that he has some sense of the scope of the clergy
sexual abuse crisis."
Even so, some victims of abuse by members of the clergy in Boston said
they had been hoping for greater change. Bernie McDaid, who said he
was abused by a priest from the ages of 11 to 13, said he feared that
the selection of another European pope amounted to a circling of the
wagons on the abuse problems.
Mr. McDaid said an outsider, perhaps from Africa or South America,
would have been more likely to shake things up.
"They might have fear of what lies ahead, so they're staying with what
they know," Mr. McDaid said. "They need drastically to change, now
more so than at any point in history."
Clem Boleche, 29, an Augustinian brother from the Philippines who is
studying to be a priest in the Archdiocese of Boston, said his
classmates at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology rushed into a room
with a television to await the announcement of the new pope. When
Cardinal Ratzinger appeared on the balcony, he said, the room grew
silent.
Brother Boleche said he and many others were hoping for someone less
conservative and more open to debating church doctrine.
"I'm honestly not surprised, but I think it would have been more
exciting, more of a challenge, if he came from a different area,"
Brother Boleche said. "Latin America is alive. It is open, and is not
stifling the spirit like many European churches."
German-Americans acknowledge that the church is less vibrant in
Europe, but it made them no less proud on Tuesday. Janien Guntermann,
37, a bartender at a German restaurant in the Lincoln Square
neighborhood of Chicago, said she cried when she heard of the election
of Cardinal Ratzinger.
"I had goose bumps immediately," said Ms. Guntermann, whose parents
were born in Germany. "I was a little concerned about his age, but he
seems to be in good health. We have to worry about right now, not
what's going to happen in 10 years."
Jim Glunz, the owner of Glunz Bavarian Haus, a German restaurant in
the same neighborhood, said he was impressed with the new pope's name,
which he associates with peace and healing.
"This is the type of atmosphere we need in the world right now," Mr.
Glunz said. "We need a lot of healing; we need a lot of forgiving."
For every proud German-American, though, there was at least one
Italian-American wondering if Italy's turn at the papacy would ever
come again.
Inside the Mola Club in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, where Italian men
gather to play cards and smoke cigars, a big-screen TV was tuned to
RAI, a state broadcast from Italy. The room smelled like wet paint,
much of the furniture was covered in plastic, and everything was
pushed to the center of the room.
Most of the men were out in the garden, but Sal Chimienti, 68, sat at
a small table in front the TV.
"I'm a Catholic," he said, explaining his devotion to the TV
broadcast.
As the ceremonies in Rome progressed, Mr. Chimienti was joined by Al
Sale, 50, who runs a grocery store a block up Court Street.
The new pope appeared on the screen, and Mr. Sale clapped, then said,
"Still, we have no Italian pope."
Reporting for this article was contributed by Michael Brick and
Nicholas Confessore from New York, John M. Broder from Los
Angeles,Gretchen Ruethling from Chicago, Robin Toner from
Washingtonand Katie Zezima from Boston.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20watch.html
THE TV WATCH
White or Black? Maybe Beige? As Smoke Detectors, the Anchors Were All Too
Fallible
By ALESSANDRA STANLEY
Infallibility is expected of popes and television anchors, so there
was something arresting about the confused scramble to interpret the
first creamy wisps of smoke floating from the Vatican chimney
yesterday.
"Darned if it doesn't look darker," said Charles Gibson of ABC, trying
to square the appearance of white smoke with the absence of
confirmation from the Vatican bell tower. All the networks went live
at the first puff of smoke and as they waited, watched and deliberated
(beige? charcoal?), none of the anchors could be certain of what they
were seeing.
"Can you hear bells?" Mr. Gibson asked David Wright, an ABC
correspondent on the ground at St. Peter's.
"I can't hear you," Mr. Wright replied.
"Yes, but can you hear bells?" Mr. Gibson asked, more loudly.
"I'm trying to tell people just what is going on and I don't have the
faintest idea," Mr. Gibson said ruefully.
Those long minutes of suspense and clammy uncertainty turned the
conclusion of the conclave into a riveting spectacle - no other
television event is as rare or as murky. Football announcers may not
know which team will win the Super Bowl, but they know the rules, are
fairly confident it will take place every year and can draw on
previous experience. Oscar presenters have a similar advantage.
Perhaps only Election Night in 2000 was as fraught with uncertainty
and, even then, there were only two likely presidential candidates and
no lifetime tenure.
The conclave, moreover, offered the ultimate clash between modern
technology and ancient Roman Catholic ritual - and 21st-century
television thrives on it. Why else would a Roman Curia capable of
announcing the death of John Paul II by text message let the cameras
of the world divine that a new pope had been chosen by reading smoke
signals and chimes.
For years, networks from all over the world have been paying
exorbitant rents for Roman terraces with an unobstructed view of the
roof of St. Peter's Basilica. Satellite transmission, 24-hour cable
news stations, cellular phones and other advancements were supposed to
keep guesswork out of the process. As soon as the conclave began, CNN
and CNN.com kept a Vatican ChimneyCam, live, on their screens as a
multimedia smoke alert. And yet, yesterday, the crowds in St. Peter's
Square seemed to know what had happened long before the television
experts.
Except for the speed with which the cardinals settled on a successor
to John Paul II, there was little surprise to the election results.
The head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was a
leading candidate going into the conclave, and one of the best-known
cardinals. Or, as Chris Matthews put it on MSNBC, the new pope "is not
a new kid on the block."
So television reporters were ready and eager to describe what kind of
pope the former cardinal was likely to be. Trying to sum up Cardinal
Joseph Ratzinger as a guardian of strict orthodoxy and the leading
opponent of dissent, John Roberts of CBS said he was sometimes known
as "God's Rottweiler." On CNN, Wolf Blitzer cited descriptions of him
as "Cardinal No."
Reporters and analysts had boned up on Cardinal Ratzinger's biography,
as well as papal history, and easily cited all kinds of Vatican
arcana, from the number of previous German popes to the unexpected
longevity of Leo XIII, who was elected in 1878 at the age of 68 as a
"transitional" pope and instead reigned for 25 years.
But many stumbled as they tried to call the pope by his correct new
name. One called him "Cardinal Benedict XVI," another said "Pope
Ratzinger" and still another referred to him as "John Benedict XVI."
Television screens quickly filled with instant Ratzinger experts,
priests and biographers who could describe his theology and
personality (a good listener, tough on heretics). The words "humble"
and "pastoral" quickly became buzzwords on every network.
It was those few moments of uncertainty, however, that haunted those
who had to hold forth, live, on the air, for minutes with no idea what
color smoke was floating to the sky. Mr. Blitzer on CNN kept going
back to the tape.
"It's clearly white," he said. "In hindsight."
----------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20profile.html
From Wartime Germany to the Papacy
By DANIEL J. WAKIN
ROME, April 19 - The man who has become Pope Benedict XVI was a
product of wartime Germany, but also of a deeply Roman Catholic
region, Bavaria.
As the Nazis strengthened their stranglehold on Germany in the 1930's,
the strongly Catholic family of Joseph Ratzinger moved frequently
among villages in rural Bavaria.
"Unemployment was rife," he wrote in his memoir, "Milestones." "War
reparations weighed heavily on the German economy. Battles among the
political parties set people against one another." His father, he
wrote, was a determined anti-Nazi.
The Roman Catholic Church, Cardinal Ratzinger recalled, was his
bulwark against the Nazi regime, "a citadel of truth and righteousness
against the realm of atheism and deceit."
But he could not avoid the realities of the day. In an episode certain
to be scrutinized anew, Joseph Ratzinger was briefly and
unenthusiastically a member of the Hitler Youth in his early teens,
after membership became mandatory in 1941, according to a biography by
John L. Allen Jr., who covers the Vatican for The National Catholic
Reporter.
In 1943, he and fellow seminarians were drafted. He deserted in 1945
and returned home, but was captured by American soldiers and held as a
prisoner of war for several months, Mr. Allen wrote.
Along his way to the papacy, he built a distinguished academic career
as a theologian, and then spent nearly a quarter century as Pope John
Paul II's theological visionary - and enforcer of strict positions on
doctrine, morality and the primacy of the faith.
In addition to his subtle and powerful intellect lies a spiritual,
almost mystical side rooted in the traditional Bavarian landscape of
processions, devotions to Mary and small country parishes, said
John-Peter Pham, a former Vatican diplomat who has written about
Cardinal Ratzinger.
"It's a Christianity of the heart, not unlike that of the late pope's
Poland," he said. "It's much different than the cerebral theology
traditionally associated with German theology."
His experience under the Nazis - he was 18 when the war ended - was
formative in his view of the function of the church, Mr. Allen said.
"Having seen fascism in action, Ratzinger today believes that the best
antidote to political totalitarianism is ecclesiastical
totalitarianism," he wrote. "In other words, he believes the Catholic
Church serves the cause of human freedom by restricting freedom in its
internal life, thereby remaining clear about what it teaches and
believes."
Totalitarianism, indeed, critics might say.
They cite a long list of theologians Cardinal Ratzinger has chastised
for straying from official doctrine; his condemnation of "relativism,"
or the belief that other denominations and faiths lead equally to
salvation; his denunciation of liberation theology, homosexuality and
feminism; his attempt to rein in national bishops conferences; his
belief that the Second Vatican Council of the 1960's, which led to a
near-revolutionary modernization of the church, has brought corrosive
excesses.
In effect, he has argued for a purer church at the expense of size.
Hans Küng, one of the theologians who ran afoul of him, has called his
ideology a "medieval, anti-Reformation, anti-modern paradigm of the
church and the papacy."
"To have him as pope will be considered by many Catholics to mean that
the church is absolutely unable to reform itself," he said, "and that
you are not to have any hope for the great process of the Second
Vatican Council."
Along with Bavaria and Nazism, a third influence helped shape the new
pope: the leftist-inspired student unrest of the 1960's at the dawn of
domestic German terrorism. He said it made him realize that,
sometimes, there is no room for discussion.
Even before becoming the supreme pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church,
Cardinal Ratzinger wielded immense power. John Paul appointed him
prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the former
Holy Office. It was a deeply personal choice, made without his usual
wide consultation.
Their regular Friday discussions were said to be often freewheeling.
The cardinal expanded the power of the role, ruling on a wide range of
subjects. He was the first professional theologian in the job in more
than a century, one equipped with a strong intellect and decisiveness.
"This is a man who can deal with a lot of difficult material without
becoming upset," said the Rev. Augustine Di Noia, who was the under
secretary of the congregation.
John Paul was said to have given Cardinal Ratzinger wide latitude;
some called him the "vice pope." Other Vatican officials have
suggested he served as a lightning rod, diverting criticism from the
pope.
As dean of the College of Cardinals, he was also the most powerful of
them - their leader in the period after John Paul's death, the
celebrant of his funeral Mass and their guide during the conclave.
Behind his fearsome reputation lies a "a simple person," Father Di
Noia said. "He chuckles. There's a simple childlike quality to him."
Others speak of his dry sense of humor and modest demeanor.
He is a diminutive man with deep-set eyes and white hair, and speaks
Italian - the language of the Vatican - with a strong German accent.
Unlike John Paul, he had little time for sports or strenuous activity,
other than walks in the mountains.
Until now, he lived in a small apartment near the Vatican and walked
to work. He was perhaps the best-known cardinal, appearing at Vatican
news conferences and known to many through his books and profiles of
him in newspapers.
Joseph Alois Ratzinger was born April 16, 1927, in Marktl am Inn in
Bavaria, the youngest of three children. It was a part of a region
long within the orbit of Salzburg, in Austria, Mozart's birthplace. A
pianist, Cardinal Ratzinger expressed a great love for the composer.
Partly because of his father's opposition to the Nazis, he wrote, the
family moved four times before Joseph was 10. His mother was a hotel
cook.
He entered the seminary in 1939. After conscription, he served in an
antiaircraft unit. He has said the unit was attacked by Allied forces
in 1943, but he did not take part in that battle because a finger
infection had prevented him from learning to shoot. After about a year
in the antiaircraft unit he was drafted into the regular military,
sent home and then called up again before deserting in late April
1945, according to Mr. Allen. He told Time magazine in 1993 that while
stationed near Hungary, he saw Hungarian Jews being sent to death
camps.
In discussing his war experience, Mr. Allen wrote that he publicly
expressed little of the explicit horrors that were around him; of the
resistance to the Nazis by groups other than Catholics; or of the
anti-Semitism of a prominent great-uncle.
In the fall after the war ended in 1945, he returned to the seminary,
where his brother, Georg - who was soon to be a prominent church music
director - was also enrolled. The brothers were was ordained in 1951;
two years later Joseph Ratzinger earned his doctorate at the
University of Munich. His dissertation was titled "The People and
House of God in St. Augustine's Doctrine of the Church." He earned his
teaching licentiate in 1957.
One of his most influential books was an early work from his
university lectures, "Introduction to Christianity." He also wrote
"Dogma and Revelation" and "Eschatology."
In his view, the church does not exist so that it can be incorporated
into the world, but so as to offer a way to live. It is not a human
edifice but a divinely created one. And theology is not a dry academic
exercise. Theologians should support church teaching to serve the
faithful, not depart from it.
His career as an academic began immediately after he was licensed. He
spent two years teaching dogma and fundamental theology at the
University of Freising and 10 years at the University of Bonn. He also
had stints at the universities Münster and Tübingen. Alienated by the
student protests at Tübingen, he moved to Regensburg in 1969.
In a 1985 interview with The New York Times, he called the protests "a
radical attack on human freedom and dignity, a deep threat to all that
is human." Such actions taught him, he said, that to discuss terror
was to collaborate with it. "I learned where discussion must stop
because it is turning into a lie and resistance must begin in order to
maintain freedom."
Already in 1962, at 35, he achieved prominence at the highest levels
of the church. A mutual acquaintance introduced him to Cardinal Joseph
Frings, archbishop of Cologne. Cardinal Frings asked him to serve as
his expert assistant at the Second Vatican Council. Father Ratzinger
was credited with pushing Cardinal Frings to join French and other
German bishops in standing firm against the Vatican Curia members who
wanted to hold back council reforms. He also helped write a speech
criticizing the Holy Office, the predecessor to his future home, the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The speech called it
outmoded and a "source of scandal to the world."
Yet within a decade he came to express deep worry that the church was
drifting to the left and losing its ecclesiastical rigor.
In 1977, Pope Paul VI appointed him archbishop of Munich, and made him
a cardinal in just three months. That same year, he met the future
John Paul II, although some have said that they might have met at the
Second Vatican Council. They both spent their youths under
totalitarianism, but they also had a feeling that the church was
adrift in a permissive sea, and that there was a need to return to the
fundamentals.
John Paul appointed him to the doctrinal congregation in 1981. Soon,
he was taking action against liberation theology, the Marxist-inspired
movement of priests in Latin America to help the poor by radical
restructuring of society. The congregation denounced the movement in
1984; Leonardo Boff, a Brazilian liberation theologian, was summoned
and silenced for a year.
Other theologians were chastised. Charles E. Curran, a theologian at
Catholic University of America, was barred in 1986 from teaching at a
Catholic institution for refusing to recant his challenge to church
teaching on sexuality. The Rev. Tissa Balasuriya, a Sri Lanka
theologian, was excommunicated in 1997 after being accused of
challenging fundamental Catholic tenets like original sin and the
Immaculate Conception. More than a dozen others have been disciplined
by the congregation.
With the end of the cold war, Cardinal Ratzinger turned his attention
to fighting "relativism." His congregation's 2000 declaration "Dominus
Jesus" - "Lord Jesus" - said other religions could not offer
salvation, and were "gravely deficient." An uproar from other
religious leaders followed, but John Paul publicly defended the
document.
Even as he celebrated the Mass leading into the conclave on Monday
morning, Cardinal Ratzinger called relativism a "dictatorship" under
which the ego and personal desires are paramount.
One of his major efforts, which many say has been successful, was to
sap national bishops' conferences of power - and even here he harkened
back to the war. The German conference issued "wan and weak"
condemnations of Nazism; the truly powerful documents, he said, "came
from individual courageous bishops."
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20third.html
In Selection of New Pope, Third World Loses Out
By LARRY ROHTER
RIO DE JANEIRO, April 19 - Not this time, not yet. Though a majority
of Roman Catholics now live in Latin America, Africa and Asia, those
among the faithful who were openly hoping for a pope from the
developing world were disappointed.
But that sense of popular disappointment stood in contrast to the
notable enthusiasm for the selection of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger
among the episcopal conferences in every country in this region, which
speak in the name of Latin America's hundreds of bishops.
Dominated by theological conservatives whom Pope John Paul II
appointed, the conferences can now expect increased Vatican support in
their efforts to counter two important challenges: evangelical
Protestantism and the remnants of liberation theology.
At the popular level, the initial response to the designation of
Cardinal Ratzinger as the new pope was muted throughout Latin America,
where 480 million of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics live.
Television networks that had been covering the conclave live from Rome
in anticipation that someone from this region might be chosen as pope
quickly returned to their normal programming after the announcement.
Newspapers and radio stations recalled that the new pope's nicknames
include Cardinal No and the Grand Inquisitor, references to his former
role as enforcer of church doctrine. "They were never going to elect a
pope from Latin America or Africa," Guilherme Marra, a salesman here,
lamented Tuesday afternoon. "The church is frozen in time," Mr. Marra,
37, complained. "Imagine electing a radical pope who is against
condoms!"
But among the church hierarchy, at least here in Brazil, which has the
world's largest Roman Catholic population, the prospect of an even
more doctrinaire and conservative successor to John Paul II has
already emboldened traditionalists. Last week, for example, two
cardinals criticized President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, saying that
his beliefs were "not Catholic but chaotic" and that he was "not a
model Christian."
Like the leaders of several other Latin American countries, Mr. da
Silva has taken positions that differ from church teachings on
abortion, homosexuality, contraception and stem cell research.
Cardinal Ratzinger's support for an unyielding stance on those and
other issues would seem likely to increase the prospect of conflicts
between church and state.
It is not clear how Pope Benedict XVI intends to respond to the growth
of Islam in Africa and Asia, where most of the increase in the number
of Catholics during the papacy of John Paul II occurred. But the
Catholic flock in those places tends to be more doctrinally
conservative than in Latin America, and expressed fewer reservations
about the choice of Cardinal Ratzinger.
"You need a man of values," said Alfred Jantjies, a South African
truck driver. "It's no good to have a man in the church who lets in
wrong ideas, like women priests or priests getting married. A man of
God must know he has taken a tough life and stick to it without trying
to be all modern. The new pope sounds like a man who understands what
worked in the past and won't try and change it."
In the days before the conclave, some priests and bishops in Latin
America made public their doubts about Cardinal Ratzinger's
willingness to bring about the change that they thought the church
needed. As John Paul II's right-hand man, he was often seen as the
standard-bearer of what some critics in the region are calling
"Wojtylism without Wojtyla," a reference to Karol Wojtyla, who became
John Paul II.
"I don't think he has the charisma of John Paull II with the masses,
because he has always been an intellectual," said the Rev. Jesús
Vergara, the director general of Centro Tata Vasco, a Jesuit
institution in Mexico City. "For example, the trips of John Paul II
throughout Latin America. Well, Latin America is going to feel a lot
of grief because I don't think Ratzinger has the personality to win
over most of the people in Latin America as John Paul did."
As leader of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal
Ratzinger has been very much a known quantity to all cardinals and
bishops and to many priests. In that capacity, he has played an
important role in suppressing liberation theology, which draws on
Marxism in its call for the church to follow a "preferential option
for the poor" and transform unjust structures that perpetuate social
inequality and poverty.
"It seems to me that we need not a theology of liberation, but a
theology of martyrdom," he said in 1997.
In 1984, for instance, it was Cardinal Ratzinger who oversaw the
Vatican decree that forced Leonardo Boff, a former Franciscan friar
and a leading theoretician of liberation theology, to silence himself
for "an opportune period." Dr. Boff, once a student of Cardinal
Ratzinger, was deemed to lack "serenity" and "moderation" in his
writings, which were said to be guided not by faith but by "principles
of an ideological nature."
Dr. Boff, who resigned as a cleric in 1992 and now teaches theology
and ethics at a state university here, has complained of what he
called "the arrogance and doctrinal fundamentalism" of John Paul II.
But he has been an even sharper critic of Cardinal Ratzinger,
describing him in a recent essay as "the exterminator of the future of
ecumenism" and "the petrified expression" of the dominance of the
Roman Curia within the church.
With Cardinal Ratzinger at the helm of the church, conservatives can
expect even greater support for movements like Opus Dei and Communion
and Liberation, which are strong in places like Chile and Peru. In
2001, John Paul II appointed the first Opus Dei member to become a
cardinal, Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne of Lima, and seven of that
country's bishops belong to Opus Dei.
Bishop Raul Vera of Saltillo, who in the 1990's practiced the
liberation theology in southern Mexico that was criticized by Pope
John Paul II, said the cardinals had made a safe choice and turned a
blind eye to the confusion in the Americas about what direction the
church was taking.
"The cardinals were thinking about security," he said. "And they were
also thinking about someone who would complete the papacy of John Paul
II."
The new pope will also be under pressure from conservative clergy and
lay people to act to brake the advance of evangelical Protestantism,
which is on the march everywhere in Latin America. Here in Brazil the
percentage of people declaring themselves as Catholics has fallen from
more than 90 percent in 1970 to barely 70 percent, with a
corresponding increase in the number of Protestants.
Not only has the new pope criticized Protestantism on a doctrinal
basis, he has also accused the World Council of Churches of "harming
the life of the gospel" by offering financial assistance to what he
called "subversive movements" in Latin America. While that may animate
conservatives in the church, it may also increase tensions.
"For some who would be looking for strong, centralized control, an
orthodox church focused on orthodoxy in the faith, those people I
think will be very happy," said Bishop Kevin Dowling, an official of
the Southern African Bishops Conference. "For people who were looking
for a church that would be open to debate and discussing and
reflecting on some of the crucial issues of modern times, those people
may have concerns."
Michael Wines contributed reporting from Johannesburg for this
article, and James C. McKinley Jr. from Mexico City.
-----------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20record.html
The New Pope on the Issues
On Secularism
"We have moved from a Christian culture to aggressive and sometimes
intolerant secularism," Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger said in November
2004 in an interview with the daily La Repubblica. "A society from
which God is completely absent self-destructs. We saw that in the
major totalitarian regimes of last century."
On Other Religions
He has repeatedly condemned "religious pluralism" and relativism, the
idea that other religions can hold the way to salvation, and he has
been instrumental in blocking the advance of priests who support such
views. In 2000 the Vatican document "Dominus Jesus," in which Cardinal
Ratzinger was the driving voice, called for a new Catholic evangelism
and described other faiths as lesser searches for the truth.
"This truth of faith does not lessen the sincere respect which the
Church has for the religions of the world," the document said, "but at
the same time, it rules out, in a radical way, that mentality of
indifferentism characterized by a religious relativism which leads to
the belief that 'one religion is as good as another.' "
The Sex Abuse Scandal
The new pope has often denounced immorality within the church. He
wrote the meditations read aloud during the Good Friday procession
this year that condemned "filth" in the church. He has been scathing,
however, about news coverage of the scandal. In December 2002, Zenit
News Services quoted him as saying that fewer than 1 percent of
priests were abusers and that American news coverage was a campaign
against the church.
"One comes to the conclusion that it is intentional, manipulated, that
there is a desire to discredit the church," he said.
Women in the Church
Cardinal Ratzinger wrote the church statement in August 2004 that
repeated the prohibition against women as priests and criticized
feminism as ignoring biological differences. It also called on
governments to "manage conditions so that women do not need to neglect
their families if they want to pursue a job."
Sexuality and Marriage
He has been a leading voice in the church for enforcing traditional
doctrine on homosexuality, extramarital sex and artificial birth
control, writing a letter to American bishops in 1988, for example,
criticizing their acceptance of condoms to stop the spread of AIDS,
saying the American view supported "the classical principle of
tolerance of the lesser evil."
He has condemned efforts to legalize same-sex marriage as "destructive
for the family and for society" and as a dangerous separation of
sexuality and fertility. A church statement in July 2003 in which he
was listed as principal author said: "There are absolutely no grounds
for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even
remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is
holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law."
Abortion and Euthanasia
Benedict has insistently spoken out against abortion, euthanasia,
stem-cell research and cloning. In his book "God and the World,"
published in October 2000, he painted a grim picture of the results of
genetic research, writing, "There is a last boundary that we cannot
cross without becoming the destroyers of creation itself."
In July 2004, the magazine L'Espresso released part of an unissued
memorandum to American bishops in which he gave guidelines for denying
Communion to politicians who supported abortion rights.
--------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/international/worldspecial2/20ptext.html
April 20, 2005
TRANSCRIPT
The First Words of the New Pope
Following is a transcript of Pope Benedict XVI's address yesterday at
the Vatican, as recorded and translated from the Italian by Reuters:
Dear brothers and sisters:
After the great Pope John Paul II, the cardinals have elected me, a
simple, humble worker in the Lord's vineyard.
I am comforted by the fact that the Lord knows how to work and act
even with insufficient instruments. And above all, I entrust myself to
your prayers.
With the joy of the risen Lord and confidence in his constant help, we
will go forward. The Lord will help us, and Mary, his most holy
mother, will be alongside us.
Thank you.
----------------
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/international/europe/POPE_CHRONOLOGY.html
Key Dates in Papacy
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
The following articles highlight signifigant events during the papacy
of Pope John Paul II going back to 1978. Also, [30]search previous
articles on the pope.
November 6, 1978 | PDF Format
[31]After Two Conclaves, a Polish Pope
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
The election of Pope John Paul II, a strong-willed, vigorous Polish
prelate and the first non-Italian head of the Roman Catholic Church in
455 years, has given a new dimension to the Vatican's global political
role.
January 27, 1979 | PDF Format
[32]Over a Million in Mexico City Excitedly Greet the Pope
By ALAN RIDING
Pope John Paul II was given an exicted welcome by more than one
million Mexicans when he arrived here today to open a crucial Latin
American bishops' conference on his first trip abroad since becoming
Pope four months ago.
June 3, 1979 | PDF Format
[33]Pope Gets Big Welcome in Poland, Offers Challenge to the
Authorities
By DAVID A. ANDELMAN
Pope John Paul II returned home to Poland to a tumultuous weklcome
today and immediately pledged the Roman Catholic Church to "serve
people in the temporal dimension of their life and existence."
October 3, 1979 | PDF Format
[34]A City Opens Its Heart to John Paul
By LAURIE JOHNSTON
"Nasza Modlitwa Z Papiezem" (Our Prayer Is With the Pope), read the
Polish-language banners and badges, whether from Westchester County or
Wauekegan, Ill. "Totus Tuus Papa" (I Am All Yours, Pope), other
banners promised in Latin.
May 14, 1981
[35]Pope Is Shot in Car in Vatican Square; Surgeons Term Condition
Serious
By HENRY TANNER
Pope John Paul II was shot and seriously wounded yesterday as he was
standing in an open car moving slowly among more than 10,000
worshipers in St. Peter's Square.
April 14, 1986
[36]Pope Speaks in Rome Synagogue, in the First Such Visit on Record
By E.J. DIONNE Jr.
Pope John Paul II, embracing the world's Jews as ''our elder
brothers,'' today paid the first recorded papal visit to a synagogue
and condemned persecution and displays of anti-Semitism ''at any time
and by anyone.''
December 2, 1989
[37]Gorbachev Visits Pope at Vatican; Ties Are Forged
By CLYDE HABERMAN
With an agreement to begin official relations and a pledge of expanded
religious freedom for Soviet citizens, President Mikhail S. Gorbachev
joined hands today with Pope John Paul II.
May 3, 1991
[38]Papal Encyclical Urges Capitalism to Shed Injustices
By PETER STEINFELS
In a major encyclical addressing the economic questions raised by the
upheaval in Eastern Europe in 1989, Pope John Paul II warned
capitalist nations yesterday against letting the collapse of Communism
blind them to the need to repair injustices in their own economic
system.
November 1, 1992
[39]Vatican Science Panel Told By Pope: Galileo Was Right
By REUTERS
Moving formally to rectify a wrong, Pope John Paul II acknowledged in
a speech today that the Roman Catholic Church had erred in condemning
Galileo 359 years ago for asserting that the Earth revolves around the
Sun.
October 6, 1993
[40]Encyclical on Morality Doesn't Stifle Debate, Church Officials Say
By PETER STEINFELS
Roman Catholic officials at the Vatican and in the United States
presented Pope John Paul II's new encyclical, "Veritatis Splendor"
("The Splendor of Truth"), in very conciliatory tones today. They
insisted that his statement on fundamental moral theory was intended
to encourage reflection and discussion of basic principles of
morality, not to cut off debate.
December 31, 1993
[41]Diplomatic Pact Signed by Israel and the Vatican
By CLYDE HABERMAN
Formally recognizing each other after decades of diplomatic aloofness
and centuries of frequent Jewish-Catholic rancor, Israel and the
Vatican signed an agreement today to establish diplomatic relations.
March 27, 2000
[42]Ending Pilgrimage, the Pope Asks God for Brotherhood
By DEBORAH SONTAG and ALESSANDRA STANLEY
Pope John Paul II approached the Western Wall, reached out to touch
its stone, and tucked into a crevice a note to God.
April 24, 2002
[43]Pope Offers Apology to Victims of Sex Abuse by Priests
By MELINDA HENNEBERGER
Pope John Paul II opened meetings with American cardinals on clerical
sex scandals with an apology to victims.
June 6, 2003
[44]Vatican Traveler in Croatia, Reaching 100, Trips, That Is
By FRANK BRUNI
Pope John Paul II's visit to Croatia marks the 100th time that he has
left Vatican City for a foreign adventure.
April 3, 2005 | Obituary
[45]Pope John Paul II, Church Shepherd and a Catalyst for World Change
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
Pope John Paul II captivated much of humanity and reshaped the church
with a heroic vision of a combative, disciplined Catholicism.
References
30. http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?srcht=s&srchst=&vendor=&query=%22Pope+John+Paul+II%22&date_select=full&submit.x=53&submit.y=11
31. http://www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/international/19781106pope.pdf
32. http://www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/international/19790127pope.pdf
33. http://www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/international/19790603pope.pdf
34. http://www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/international/19791003pope.pdf
35. http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/14/international/europe/14POPE.html
36. http://www.nytimes.com/1986/04/14/international/europe/14POPE.html
37. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/02/international/europe/02POPE.html
38. http://www.nytimes.com/1991/05/03/international/europe/03POPE.html
39. http://www.nytimes.com/1992/11/01/international/europe/01POPE.html
40. http://www.nytimes.com/1993/10/06/national/06POPE.html
41. http://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/31/international/middleeast/31POPE.html
42. http://www.nytimes.com/2000/03/27/international/middleeast/27POPE.html
43. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/24/national/24VATI.html
44. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/06/international/europe/06POPE.html
45. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/03/international/europe/03pope.html
---------------
The New York Times > Opinion > Editorial: The New Pope
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/opinion/20wed1.html
April 20, 2005
EDITORIAL
The New Pope
Since almost all of the cardinals who met to choose a new pope were
appointees of John Paul II, it's probably not all that surprising that
they chose someone as close as possible to the late pontiff. Cardinal
Joseph Ratzinger, the new Pope Benedict XVI, worked in close
partnership with his predecessor and shared a belief in staunchly
defending orthodox Catholic doctrine. There is no reason to expect any
change, of course, for the church when it comes to matters like birth
control, priestly celibacy or homosexuality. Those are issues of
faith, properly left to the faithful. On matters of public policy,
however, all of us have reason to be concerned about the opinions of
the leader of more than one billion Catholics.
For instance, as a cardinal, the new pope inserted himself last year
into the political debate over allowing Turkey into the European
Union. He was quoted as saying that adding Turkey, a predominantly
Muslim nation of 70 million people, would dilute the culture of what
he considers a Christian continent and that Turkey should align itself
instead with other Muslim nations. At a time when few things are more
important than reconciling the Islamic world with the non-Islamic
West, it would be extremely disturbing if the pope became an
unnecessary wedge. It would also be out of keeping with the heritage
of John Paul II - who, for all his doctrinal conservatism, was a man
known for his outreach to people of other faiths.
Like his predecessor, Benedict XVI is not Italian, but he continues
the age-old tradition of European popes at a time when the church's
membership is increasingly outside Europe. Its future appears to lie
in the Southern Hemisphere, particularly in the developing countries
of Asia and Africa, where Pope John Paul II was so beloved for his
warm, fatherly personality.
At least as a cardinal, Benedict XVI was more courtly than
charismatic. He is an accomplished polyglot who is said to speak 10
languages, a theologian of great stature and a man who has had an
academic as well as an ecclesiastical career. Anyone who heard his
homage at the late pope's funeral had to have been impressed by his
eloquence and devotion to John Paul. It is possible that the cardinals
who picked him hoped he would protect the church's core from doctrinal
corruption at a time when more and more of the faithful live in places
where congregations are used to adapting their religions to reflect
local customs and beliefs.
The new pope is, at 78, not likely to serve long enough to have the
kind of impact his predecessor had. But the church has seen men
elected as supposedly transitional figures in the past turn into
agents for sweeping change. The beloved Pope John XXIII was a recent
example. And in an era as fraught with peril as today's, anyone who
occupies the throne of St. Peter is given overwhelming power to do
good and responsibility to prevent harm. Today, the world can only
wish Pope Benedict XVI strength and inspiration as he takes on this
extraordinary burden of spiritual, moral and political leadership.
----------------
Op-Ed Contributor: Rome's Radical Conservative
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/opinion/20novak.html
By MICHAEL NOVAK
Washington
THE election of Cardinal Josef Ratzinger as pope was John Paul II's
last gift to the Roman Catholic Church. No cardinal was closer to John
Paul II, or talked at length with him more often. In his sermon at the
memorial for the late pope, Cardinal Ratzinger, with perfect pitch,
praised his predecessor's gifts in poetry, drama and art, and the
sweep of his vision and accomplishments. The sermon was interrupted
many times by hearty applause, especially from the young.
Cardinal Ratzinger's selection as pope, however, has been less
heartily welcomed by many commentators in Europe and the United
States, who have quickly characterized him as an "authoritarian," a
"watchdog" and, most peculiarly, a "neoconservative."
But this is a severe misreading of the man and shows that his critics
paid little attention to that sermon, how he connected with the
million or so young people who turned out, led not by enthusiasm, but
by a remarkable sense of prayer, devotion and respectful silence.
The new pope will not be a clone of the old. I've spoken to him
several times over the last 40 years, and he is a much shyer man,
quieter, more like a country pastor or a scholar than like an actor
striding across all history as his stage. When one approaches him, he
seems to back up an inch or two in diffidence. His voice is much
softer than one expects.
Yet his ideas about the changes needed by church institutions are, on
the face of it, more radical than those of John Paul II, who was much
more focused on the world at large than on the structure of the
church. Benedict XVI learned from the Germany of the 1930's that too
much care to preserve Catholic institutions, without powerful
intellectual commitment in many souls, brings disaster. He may be much
more willing to let go of institutions he considers only tepidly
Catholic than people expect. And more serious about the life of the
soul.
On the other hand, he has written of his joy in those Catholics who
may be estranged, but still return at least for Christmas or Easter
masses. He is glad that they draw nourishment from the liturgy. He
holds that the Catholic church must always be reaching out, far beyond
its present ranks, as the first tiny communities of Christians did,
caring for the poor and orphans far outside their own small ranks. He
does not want a small, closed church, but an expansive, open one - and
a serious one.
One of the characteristics the new pope much cherishes is "openness to
the whole" - to the whole of history, to the whole of the human race.
He boasts of never having wanted to start his own "school" of
theological thought - though as a renowned professor in Germany he
could well have done so - but rather to have opened the minds of his
students to whole vast fields of human thought, in all traditions and
places and times.
He is praised for just such warmth and openness by Protestant and
Jewish leaders with whom he has long been in scholarly conversation.
(Again, his behavior is the very opposite of the stereotypes invented
by his critics.)
The world will discover the true man behind the stereotypes soon
enough, for Cardinal Ratzinger has been one of the senior churchmen of
recent times most open to journalists. He has allowed probing
interviews lasting several days, all caught on dictating machines and
published as best-selling books, organized by fine journalists like
Vittorio Messori and Peter Seewald. We should not be surprised to see
more publications from him as pope.
Often Cardinal Ratzinger sharply portrayed a crucial parting of the
ways: between modernizing the church, so as to seem to appeal to
modern men at the expense of fidelity to the word of Jesus Christ; and
being faithful to the word, at the expense of losing numbers. He has
been quite fearless about choosing the second alternative. But he has
also noted, correctly, that the parishes and dioceses that choose
"modernization" usually end up losing numbers, while the more serious
churches grow mightily. In particular, the churches of Africa and
Asia, which have shown the most rapid growth, are the ones most intent
on fidelity to the New Testament.
One of Cardinal Ratzinger's central, and most misunderstood, notions
is his conception of liberty, and he is very jealous in thinking
deeply about it, pointing often to Tocqueville. He is a strong foe of
socialism, statism and authoritarianism, but he also worries that
democracy, despite its great promise, is exceedingly vulnerable to the
tyranny of the majority, to "the new soft despotism" of the
all-mothering state, and to the common belief that liberty means doing
whatever you please. Following Lord Acton and James Madison, Cardinal
Ratzinger has written of the need of humans to practice
self-government over their passions in private life.
He also fears that Europe, especially, is abandoning the search for
objective truth and sliding into pure subjectivism. That is how the
Nazis arose, he believes, and the Leninists. When all opinions are
considered subjective, no moral ground remains for protesting against
lies and injustices.
Pope John Paul II thought the first issue of his time was the
murderous politics that resulted from the separation of Europe into
two by the Soviet Union. He saw it as chiefly a political issue, to be
defeated by moral means.
Pope Benedict XVI, like several of his namesakes back to St. Benedict
himself (the founder of Western monasticism and patron saint of
Europe), is more likely to take culture as the central issue of the
new millennium: What is the culture necessary to preserve free
societies from their own internal dangers - and to make them worthy of
the sacrifices that brought them into being?
Michael Novak is a theologian at the American Enterprise Institute and
the author, most recently, of "The Universal Hunger for Liberty."
------------------
Opinion > Benedict XVI Greets the World (5 Letters)
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/opinion/l20pope.html
April 20, 2005
Benedict XVI Greets the World (5 Letters)
To the Editor:
With deep joy I offer Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger my warm
congratulations and most fervent good wishes on his election to the
papacy.
Joseph Ratzinger is a man rich in spiritual passion, humility,
self-denial and love for the cause of God and of man. As Pope Benedict
XVI, he brings to the papacy a brilliant philosophical and, in
particular, theological mind that has embraced a vision of broad
spiritual and ecclesiastical horizons: personal holiness, missionary
outreach combined with constant concern for unity, and the necessary
integration of spirituality and institutional ministry.
His episcopal motto, "Co-worker of the Truth," has guided him in his
tireless and uncompromising efforts aimed at defending and promoting
the Catholic faith and its morals against modern errors.
The new pope has also worked to encourage studies aimed at increasing
knowledge of the faith so that the new problems arising from the
progress of science and civilization can be answered in the light of
the word of God.
The aim for which he has always strived has been to serve the truth,
seek to know it ever more thoroughly and make it ever more widely
known.
Paul Kokoski
Hamilton, Ontario, April 19, 2005
To the Editor:
The new pope is known as humble but extremely doctrinaire.
As a Vatican insider for many years, he will probably be averse to the
necessary changes Catholicism needs to give it the dynamism necessary
for the new millennium.
I think that the cardinals chose this elderly and dogmatic leader as a
transitional figurehead because of their tentative desire to adjust to
the new global realities.
I wish him well and only hope that he realizes that the real world is
leaving the church behind.
Anthony J. Frascino
Audubon, N.J., April 19, 2005
To the Editor:
Congratulations are in order to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger on becoming
Pope Benedict XVI. While he faces many new challenges with his new
position, I would argue that there is nothing more important than
reaching out to those of different faiths to find common ground.
Analysis of most of the world's geopolitical problems can be traced to
tensions between and among religions.
The papacy brings a powerful microphone with it, I hope that Pope
Benedict XVI uses it to advance new cooperation between and among
different religions.
Steven M. Clayton
Ocean, N.J., April 19, 2005
To the Editor:
One of the main reasons for the decline of Catholicism not only in
Europe but also in Latin America, Canada and the United States and for
the abandonment of the priesthood isn't mentioned in "Europeans Fast
Falling Away From Church" (news article, April 19): the modernization
of the Mass under Pope Paul VI more than 30 years ago.
The new Mass simply does not convey spirituality or inspire awe.
Let us hope that Pope Benedict XVI will be as assiduous in reinstating
orthodoxy to public prayer and the liturgy as he has been in
safeguarding doctrine.
Marc A. Loera
Inglewood, Calif., April 19, 2005
To the Editor:
According to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the newly elected pope, "a
dictatorship of relativism is being built that recognizes nothing as
definite" (front page, April 19). But his insistence that the Catholic
Church must defend itself from such moral chaos by adhering to age-old
traditional Catholic teaching ignores the fact that the church has
changed in many ways since its first incarnation - often wisely and of
necessity.
The doctrinal rigidity that the new pope has called for, with its
selective emphasis on sexuality and sex-based prohibitions, is no less
ideological than the secular movements he deplores and no more likely
to save the church from the perils of modernity.
Edward Cahill
New York, April 19, 2005
-----------------
News bulletin from the Chronicle of Higher Education, 5.4.20
http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/04/2005042004n.htm
Election of a Conservative Pope Signals Continuing Push for Orthodoxy,
Scholars Say
By THOMAS BARTLETT
The election of a conservative German cardinal, the Rev. Joseph
Ratzinger, as the new pope is a sign that the Vatican will continue to
rein in theologians with unorthodox views, several Roman Catholic
scholars said on Tuesday. But some cautioned against prematurely
judging the new pontiff, who will be known as Pope Benedict XVI.
Benedict, who has a Ph.D. in theology from the University of Munich,
is a longtime academic who has taught at several German universities.
And in his most recent role as prefect of the Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, a post to which he was appointed in 1981 by
Pope John Paul II, who died this month, Benedict was often involved in
issues related to Catholic higher education.
"This is a guy who understands the system for Catholic colleges and
universities," said J. Patout Burns, a professor of Catholic studies
at Vanderbilt University. "I think that's going to be altogether to
the good."
Dennis M. Doyle, a professor of religious studies at the University of
Dayton, said there was "a lot of coherence and sincerity" to
Benedict's positions. Mr. Boyle said he expected that the new
pontiff's views on most issues having to do with Catholic higher
education will be similar to his predecessor's.
"I think he's often presented stereotypically and unfairly -- though
that's not to say I have the same positions he has," Mr. Doyle said.
"I grew up intellectually in an atmosphere where people were telling
me that he was the Catholic devil, but I've developed a real respect
for him."
Some scholars, like the Rev. Charles E. Curran, expressed
"disappointment" at the selection. Father Curran was banned from
teaching theology at the Catholic University of America in 1986
because of his opinions on topics like artificial birth control. The
letter informing him of the Vatican's decision was written by Cardinal
Ratzinger.
"This is obviously a sign that the papacy will continue in the same
general way as the papacy of Pope John Paul II," Father Curran, who is
now a professor of human values at Southern Methodist University, said
in a written statement. He noted that he continues to believe that
"one can disagree with some noninfallible and noncore church teachings
and still be a loyal Roman Catholic."
For more conservative Catholics, like Patrick J. Reilly, president of
the Cardinal Newman Society, the election was a cause for rejoicing.
"He is certainly not someone who has any hesitancy about telling
individuals who are teaching things contrary to Catholic faith that
they can no longer teach Catholic theology," Mr. Reilly said of the
new pope. "And that's something that I think needs to happen,
especially in the United States, and now very likely will."
Mr. Reilly said the new pontiff has a reputation of being "more of a
man of action" than John Paul II.
Others cautioned against reading too much into that reputation. "I'm
sure some folks will have doomsday scenarios, but I think that's very
premature," said the Rev. Charles L. Currie, president of the
Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities. "People are not
totally a product of their pasts. We should wait and see what this
pope says and does."
Many saw the choosing of the name "Benedict" as an indication that the
new pontiff was interested in healing divisions within the church.
Pope Benedict XV, who led the Church from 1914 to 1922, was viewed as
a theological moderate.
"The selection of the name is a handing out of an olive branch,
maybe," said the Rev. David J. Collins, an assistant professor of
history at Georgetown University. "Although at this point we're just
reading the tea leaves."
_________________________________________________________________
Background articles from The Chronicle:
* [60]Mourning a Pope Who Stressed Orthodoxy (4/15/2005)
* [61]A Theological Dissident Examines the Teachings of Pope John
Paul II (4/1/2005)
* [62]Who Is Catholic? (4/9/2004)
* [63]Pulling Back the Veil (3/19/2004)
* [64]Silence, Not Confrontation, Over the 'Mandatum' (6/14/2002)
* [65]Bishops Approve Guidelines on Church Approval of Catholic
Theologians' Teachings (6/29/2001)
* [66]Liberal Roman Catholic Theologians Say Vatican Statement Won't
Change Their Views (7/10/1998)
* [67]Vatican Bars Theologians From Public Dissent on Official
Teachings of the Catholic Church (7/4/1990)
References
45. mailto:thomas.bartlett at chronicle.com
46. http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/printable.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/04/2005042004n.htm
47. http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/printable.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/04/2005042004n.htm
48. http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/emailer.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/04/2005042004n.htm
49. http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/emailer.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/04/2005042004n.htm
60. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v51/i32/32a00101.htm
61. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v51/i30/30a03101.htm
62. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v50/i31/31a02601.htm
63. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v50/i28/28a01201.htm
64. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v48/i40/40a01001.htm
65. http://chronicle.com/weekly/v47/i42/42a01201.htm
66. http://chronicle.com/che-data/articles.dir/art-44.dir/issue-44.dir/44a01001.htm
67. http://chronicle.com/che-data/articles.dir/articles-36.dir/issue-42.dir/42a00102.htm
E-mail me if you have problems getting the referenced articles.
-----------------
Reuters > International > Germans Feel Both Pride and Doubts Over Pope
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-pope-germany.html
April 20, 2005
Germans Feel Both Pride and Doubts Over Pope
By REUTERS
Filed at 7:18 a.m. ET
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany reacted uncertainly on Wednesday to the
choice of a native son as Pope, as pride mingled with doubts that the
arch-conservative theologian reflected its self-image as secular,
liberal and progressive.
Emotions ranged from joy to outright dismay as the country digested
the news that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, a former archbishop of
Munich, had been elected Pope Benedict XVI.
``We are the Pope! It's a thousand-year sensation!'' blared
best-selling tabloid Bild, removing the usual bare-breasted model from
page one in deference to the new pontiff.
But irreverent left-wing daily Tageszeitung took the opposite view,
blacking out the entire front page apart from the words: ``Joseph
Ratzinger new Pope. Oh, my God!''
The split reflected doubts, in Germany and elsewhere, over whether the
Church's chief guardian of traditional doctrine for the past 23 years
is charismatic, vigorous and open enough to tackle the social
challenges of the 21st century.
Ratzinger was elected Tuesday -- at 78, the oldest man to ascend the
papal throne for three centuries.
``In my opinion the man is simply too old for this office,'' said
Agnes Straubinger, a resident of Munich in Ratzinger's native Bavaria.
``How will the Catholic Church ever progress if it always bases itself
in the past?''
The new pope's own brother, Georg, told ARD television he was taken
aback by the news.
``I was shocked, that's right ... I'd thought that his age and not
very stable health were a reason for the cardinals to choose someone
else,'' he said.
BREAK WITH PAST
That the spiritual and moral authority of the papacy should be wielded
by a German, 60 years after the Nazi Holocaust and World War II, is an
idea that would once have been unthinkable.
``Many did not believe such a thing possible after the terrible events
which began from Germany and which can still be felt,'' German
Catholic Cardinal Karl Lehmann said.
``It is therefore an important sign of Germany's ultimate return into
the worldwide community of peoples which is also reflected in the
Catholic Church ... This can give our country heart in many
respects.''anniversaries of the war's end and the liberation of the
Nazi death camps have been reminding Germany of the Hitler era.
Ratzinger says in his autobiography he was forced to join the Hitler
Youth as a boy and was later summoned to the military. He avoided
being enrolled into the SS, the Nazis' elite troops, by declaring his
intention of becoming a priest.
While politicians spoke of their pride at having a German pope, their
reactions seemed low-key.
Some Germans wonder if Ratzinger, often portrayed as distant and
austere, is the right man for the times. He has made clear he sees no
room for debate on vexed issues like the Church's opposition to women
priests, abortion and homosexuality.
That message is alien to many in a country that sees itself as
liberal, progressive and open-minded, and where sex and religion are
regarded as private individual issues.
``We consider the election of Ratzinger is a catastrophe,'' said Bernd
Goehring of German ecumenical group Church from Below. ``It is very
disappointing, even if it was predictable. We can expect no reform
from him in the coming years.''
Germany's even split between Catholics and Protestants -- there are
roughly 27 million of each in a country of 82 million -- further
explains why the nation as a whole will not embrace Pope Benedict in
the way that Poles did his predecessor, their countryman John Paul II.
Catholics are mainly concentrated in the south and west and
Protestants in the north -- a legacy of religious wars that swept the
country and much of Europe in the 16th century after reformer Martin
Luther broke with Rome.
--------------
AP > International > New Pope Inspired by Anti - War Pontiff
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Whats-in-a-Name.html
April 20, 2005
New Pope Inspired by Anti - War Pontiff
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:52 a.m. ET
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- The last pope named Benedict guided the church
during the dark years of World War I, espousing a policy of strict
neutrality and pushing for peace through negotiations. To honor him,
Joseph Ratzinger chose the same name.
Ratzinger told cardinals he wanted to pay homage to Benedict XV, known
for tireless efforts to help refugees and reunite a world divided by
what was then known as the Great War, an archbishop said.
The new pontiff, Benedict XVI, felt his namesake ''had done much for
reconciliation among peoples,'' Berlin Cardinal Georg Maximilian
Sterzinsky told reporters Tuesday after attending the conclave.
Ratzinger also was close to the late John Paul II -- another
peace-loving pontiff. John Paul openly opposed the U.S.-led war in
Iraq.
Choosing a new name is a pontiff's first significant act in office,
and it provides clues about the kind of leader he aspires to be.
Benedict XV, pontiff from 1914 to 1922, had the difficult task of
providing leadership for Roman Catholic countries pitted against each
other during World War I, each claiming a just fight and praying for
victory.
His neutrality, and repeated protests against weapons like poison gas,
angered both sides. He worked to help the war's innocent victims and
came up with a seven-point peace plan. It failed, but some of his
proposals were included in Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, the U.S.
president's wartime call for peace in January 1918.
The Italian-born pope was punished for his neutrality by being
excluded from 1919 talks at Versailles outside Paris, where a peace
treaty was signed.
Elsewhere, his work was honored: Muslim Turkey erected a statue to him
in Istanbul, honoring him as ''the benefactor of all people,
regardless of nation or creed.''
John-Peter Pham, a Vatican expert who worked at the Holy See from 1992
to 2002, said Benedict XV was ''in many respects the first modern
pope.''
''Benedict XV's efforts to mediate the Great War as well as his
humanitarian outreach, while also embracing the Orthodox and Muslims,
is what was for his time an unprecedented choice,'' said Pham, now a
professor at James Madison University.
Ratzinger may also have been thinking of St. Benedict, a monk who died
in the 6th century. The saint was the founder of Western monasticism.
An 18th century saint of the same name, Benedict Joseph Labre, was a
wandering pilgrim who ended up destitute. His feast day is April 16 --
Ratzinger's birthday. The newest Benedict turned 78 on Saturday.
The Italian version of Benedict, ''Benedetto,'' means one who is
blessed, and the name's Latin origin refers to a blessing.
The reigns of some of the other Benedicts, however, ended violently.
During the 10th century, Benedict V was forcibly deposed by the troops
of Holy Roman Emperor Otto I, and Benedict VI was imprisoned and
strangled by order of a rival pontiff, Boniface VII.
Benedict is one of a number of papal names of holy origin such as
Clement (''mercy''), Innocent (''hopeful'' as well as ''innocent'')
and Pius (''pious''). John is the most popular, with 23 pontiffs
taking that name. Two -- John Paul I and John Paul II -- used it in a
double name. There have been 16 Gregories and, as of Tuesday, 16
Benedicts.
------
Associated Press Writers Daniela Petroff and Maria Sanminiatelli
contributed to this report.
---------------
AP > International > Israel Praises Pope Despite Past Nazi Ties
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Israel.html
April 20, 2005
Israel Praises Pope Despite Past Nazi Ties
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 8:27 a.m. ET
JERUSALEM (AP) -- Israeli politicians and rabbis on Wednesday praised
new Pope Benedict XVI for his strong condemnations of anti-Semitism
despite the pontiff's ties to the Nazi Party as a youth.
Benedict's appointment received mixed reactions from Arabs in the Holy
Land. Muslim leaders urged him to take a more active role in solving
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, while Greek Orthodox officials
voiced hope he help unify various Christian denominations.
As a German, Benedict sets off alarm bells for many Israelis, whose
memories of the Nazi murder of 6 million Jews remain painfully vivid.
Many wondered whether he would embrace Jews as warmly as his
predecessor.
''There are good relations with him,'' Oded Ben-Hor, Israel's
ambassador to the Vatican, told Army Radio. ''Israel can certainly
coexist with him. But the real test will come over the course of
time.''
Israelis widely admired the late Pope John Paul II for his unstinting
efforts to promote Jewish-Catholic reconciliation. John Paul won many
Israeli hearts during a trip to the Holy Land in 2000 by apologizing
for Roman Catholic wrongdoing over the centuries. He also was praised
for promoting interfaith dialogue, establishing diplomatic relations
with Israel and aiding Polish Jews during the Nazi era.
As a young man, the new pope served in the Hitler Youth -- compulsory
for young Germans at the time -- and during World War II was drafted
into a German anti-aircraft unit, although he says he never fired a
shot. Though Benedict has been a leading voice in the church in
battling anti-Semitism and fostering Jewish-Catholic relations, his
past raised suspicions in the Jewish state.
''White smoke, black past,'' said the headline in the mass circulation
Yediot Ahronot. ''From the Nazi youth movement to the Vatican.''
Nonetheless, Jewish leaders said they were encouraged by the special
interest by the new pope, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in
coexistence.
''Though as a teenager he was a member of the Hitler Youth, all his
life Cardinal Ratzinger has atoned for the fact,'' said Abraham H.
Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, an American
Jewish group that battles anti-Semitism. Foxman himself was saved
during the Holocaust by his Polish nanny, who had him baptized and
raised him as a Catholic, until his Jewish parents reclaimed him at
the end of the war.
Moshe Zimmerman, a professor of German history at the Hebrew
University in Jerusalem, played down the importance of the new pope's
membership in the Hitler Youth.
''He was 18 years old when the war ended, so everything that he had to
do with the Nazi regime was as a very young man,'' he said. ''I don't
believe that there is any room for doubt that (the pope) of today is
very different than the days he belonged in the Hitler Youth.''
Tel Aviv Chief Rabbi Israeli Meir Lau -- a Holocaust survivor and a
former chief rabbi for Israeli Jews of European backgrounds -- said
his many meetings with Benedict while he was a cardinal have convinced
him of his good record on matters of concern to Israelis.
''(The last meeting) was last year, in New York, in the Museum of
Jewish Heritage of all places,'' Lau told Israel Army Radio. ''There
was a meeting of two or three rabbis with some 20 cardinals .... His
entire speech was given over to a condemnation of anti-Semitism, in
the strongest and most unambiguous terms.''
Writer Zvi Gil, also a Holocaust survivor, said he expects Benedict to
continue John Paul's favorable attitude toward Jews, precisely because
of his German past.
''His attitude to Jews in Israel will to a very significant extent be
influenced by that of his predecessor John Paul II, whose steps are
well known to us,'' Gil told Army Radio. ''And as a German I don't
think he will want to move backward from these steps toward Israeli
Jews.''
For some Israelis, the new pope's condemnation of abortion, same-sex
marriage and his embrace of other conservative stands has raised
concerns of closed-mindedness -- an attitude they fear may be
connected to residual anti-Semitism.
However, commentators say the new pope's theology mirrors that of many
Jewish religious leaders, and should not be seen as a sign of
prejudice.
''He's much more traditional, and his positions are a lot tougher than
Jewish law,'' said Lau. ''And Jewish law is my law.''
A top Muslim leader, meanwhile, urged Benedict to follow John Paul's
efforts to promote interfaith relations and resolve the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
''We hope that the new pope will give the church more roles in trying
to solve the problems that the world is facing,'' said Adnan Husseini,
director of the Waqf, or Islamic Trust. ''We hope that he will
continue the policy of John Paul II, who opposed the wall around the
Palestinian territories and called for peace between the two
peoples.''
Bishop Theophilos, the top Greek Orthodox official at the Church of
the Holy Sepulcher, called on Benedict to repair relations among
Christian denominations, though he said he was skeptical.
''I hope that he can help promote unity of the Christian churches,
especially between the Eastern Orthodox and the Latin,'' he said.
''The real obstacle to the unity of the church is the office of the
pope,'' he added. ''If ever the pope had the courage or the will to
say he is the bishop of Rome, not the vicar of Christ, then the road
to unity is opened. As long as the office of the pope remains
untouchable, the Christian Church remains divided.''
-------------
AP > International > China Hopes for Better Vatican Ties
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-China.html
April 20, 2005
China Hopes for Better Vatican Ties
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 1:43 a.m. ET
BEIJING (AP) -- China on Wednesday congratulated the newly appointed
Pope Benedict XVI and said it hoped Beijing's strained relations with
the Roman Catholic Church improve under his leadership.
''We hope under the leadership of the new pope, the Vatican side can
create favorable conditions for improving the relationship between
China and the Vatican,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said in a
statement.
China's officially atheist government broke ties with the Vatican in
1951 and has said it will consider opening relations only if the
Vatican cuts links with rival Taiwan, which split with the mainland in
1949 amid civil war.
Qin said relations between the two sides could improve under two
conditions.
''The Vatican must cut off its so-called diplomatic relations with
Taiwan, acknowledging the People's Republic of China is the only sole
legal government representing the whole of China,'' he said.
Secondly, the Vatican ''must not intervene in China's domestic
affairs, including not intervening in domestic affairs in the name of
religion,'' Qin said.
The official body representing China's Catholics also sent a
congratulatory cable to the Vatican and asked its followers to pray
for him as a gesture of congratulations, Qin said.
The Vatican is the only European government that has official
relations with Taiwan. China still claims the self-ruled island as its
territory and refuses to have any official contact with governments
that recognize its rival as a sovereign country.
China demands that Catholics worship only in churches approved by a
state-controlled church group that does not recognize the pope's
authority. The state-sanctioned China Patriotic Catholic Association
didn't send a representative to the pope's funeral, citing the dispute
over Taiwan.
The China Patriotic Catholic Association regards the pope as a
spiritual leader and follows Vatican teachings but rejects the
Vatican's role in church operations and appoints its own priests.
The association claims 4 million followers, but foreign experts say as
many as 12 million more worship in unofficial churches loyal to the
Vatican. In some areas, unofficial church members are routinely
harassed and their leaders arrested.
----------------
AP > International > The Reigns of All Popes Named Benedict
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Benedicts-List.html
April 20, 2005
The Reigns of All Popes Named Benedict
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:52 a.m. ET
A list of the reigns of all popes named Benedict:
Benedict I, 575-579
Benedict II, 684-685
Benedict III, 855-858
Benedict IV, 900-903
Benedict V, 964-964/965
Benedict VI, 972/973-974
Benedict VII, 974-983
Benedict VIII,1012-1024
Benedict IX, 1032-1044
Benedict X, 1058-1059
Benedict XI, 1303-1304
Benedict XII, 1334/1335-1342
Benedict XIII, 1724-1730
Benedict XIV, 1740-1758
Benedict XV, 1914-1922
Benedict XVI, 2005-
--------------
AP > International > Some Cardinals Get Chatty After Conclave
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Talking-Cardinals.html
April 19, 2005
Some Cardinals Get Chatty After Conclave
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:58 p.m. ET
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Whatever happened to the sacred oath of secrecy?
Cardinals were sworn to silence about everything that happened during
deliberations in the Sistine Chapel to choose a new pope. But within
hours of the conclave, some German cardinals -- delighted about the
choice of their countryman, Joseph Ratzinger -- spilled some of the
secrets.
Cardinal Joachim Meisner told reporters Tuesday night that the new
Pope Benedict XVI was elected on the fourth ballot -- the first of the
afternoon session. He added that Ratzinger got more than the required
two-thirds support.
''It was done without an electoral battle, and without propaganda,''
the archbishop of Cologne told reporters at a residence for German
priests in Vatican City. ''For me it was a miracle.''
There was spontaneous applause as soon as cardinals realized Ratzinger
had won, Meisner said.
''And I burst out crying,'' he added.
Meisner and three other German cardinals spent about 45 minutes
answering questions about the conclave and didn't seem worried about
commenting despite their vow of silence -- which Ratzinger led
himself, as dean of the College of Cardinals, when the conclave began
Monday.
One by one, cardinals filed up to a Book of the Gospels and placed
their right hands on it. Ratzinger's admonition read, in part: ''We
promise and swear not to break this secret in any way...'' To guard
against high-tech leaks by cellular phones, there were even electronic
jamming devices under a false floor in the chapel.
One query the cardinals wouldn't answer is exactly how many votes
Ratzinger garnered.
''We've already said enough,'' said Cardinal Georg Maximilian
Sterzinsky, the archbishop of Berlin.
Meisner gave a few clues about the new pope's emotional reaction on
being named. He said Benedict XVI looked ''a little forlorn'' when he
went to change into his papal vestments in the Room of Tears -- which
earned its nickname because many new pontiffs get choked up there,
realizing the enormity of their mission.
''I was worried, because when he came back dressed in his white
vestments, I thought he had forgotten his skullcap,'' Meisner said.
''But then I realized his hair is as white as his skullcap.''
Meisner added: ''By the time dinner came around, Ratzinger was looking
much better and very much like the pope.''
The new pope asked cardinals to dine together on bean soup, cold cuts,
a salad and fruit, Meisner said. The nuns who prepare their meals
didn't have time to plan a special menu, so there were only two
special treats -- ice cream and champagne.
Some U.S. cardinals also offered insight about why the vote went to
Ratzinger.
New York Cardinal Edward Egan, who worked for years in Rome and at the
Vatican, was asked whether the new pope had the support of Catholics
in Latin America and Africa.
''Obviously, he must have had support from the Third World,'' he
responded. Going into the vote, there was much speculation about the
possibility of a pope from the developing world, where most Roman
Catholics live.
Philadelphia Cardinal Justin Rigali, who worked for more than two
decades in Vatican diplomacy, said the decision to choose Ratzinger
was not made in the days leading up to the conclave or as a result of
Ratzinger's moving homily at Pope John Paul II's funeral.
''Decisions like this are not made on how a person impresses you in
the last five minutes, the last hours, the last days,'' he said.
Rigali said the cardinals in the conclave thought about what John Paul
had accomplished. Ratzinger was close to the late pope.
''We were looking for a successor of (St.) Peter,'' the first pope,
Rigali said. ''We were looking for a successor of John Paul II. All of
us were talking about the incredible qualities of John Paul II,
knowing the world is calling him 'The Great.'''
------
Associated Press Writer Angela Doland and AP Religion Writer Rachel
Zoll contributed to this report.
--------------
AP > International > No Reports of Benedict Health Problems
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Ratzinger-Health.html
April 19, 2005
No Reports of Benedict Health Problems
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:48 p.m. ET
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- The new Pope Benedict XVI has no apparent history
of chronic health problems, but the 78-year-old German has been
hospitalized at least twice since the early 1990s, according to
records and reports.
In September 1991, he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage that temporarily
affected his left field of vision, according to the veteran Vatican
journalist John Allen in his 2000 book ''Cardinal Ratzinger.'' There
is no indication that it left any lingering health difficulties.
In August 1992, he cut his head after slipping in the bathroom during
a vacation in the Italian Alps, the Italian news agency ANSA reported
at the time.
Thomas Frauenlob, director of St. Michael's seminary in Traunstein
where the pope studied as a youth and still visits annually, said he
had never heard of any major ailments.
''He seems healthy,'' said Frauenlob, who last saw him over the New
Year's holiday. ''He comes and eats and drinks whatever he wants.''
But the Rev. Thomas Reese, an expert on Vatican affairs, believed the
new pontiff's health was ''not that good'' during the past year. He
gave no specifics.
--------------
AP > International > A Look at Some Previous Pope Benedicts
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Name.html?pagewanted=print&position=
April 19, 2005
A Look at Some Previous Pope Benedicts
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:50 p.m. ET
Benedict, the name of the new pope, is one of the more frequent
choices made by pontiffs. A look at some previous Benedicts:
--Benedict XV (reigned 1914-1922): He was chosen as a contrast with
his predecessor Pius X, whose theological crackdown against
''modernism'' had roiled the church. His accession coincided with the
start of World War I.
--Benedict XIV (1740-1758): He was a compromise choice after an
arduous six-month conclave. Like former professor Cardinal Joseph
Ratzinger, he was considered a scholar.
--Benedict XIII (1724-1730): A rare pope from a religious order, the
Dominicans, he remained head of his former Italian diocese as well as
the bishop of Rome.
--Benedict XII (1335-1342): He was one of the French popes who reigned
from Avignon instead of Rome, considered a bleak era for the papacy.
--Benedict XI (1303-1304): Also a Dominican, he was considered
scholarly and a peacemaker among church factions.
---------------
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-List.html
April 19, 2005
Popes Who Have Served Since 19th Century
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 1:53 p.m. ET
Popes who have served since the 19th century:
Pius VII -- March 14, 1800-Aug. 20, 1823.
Leo XII -- Sept. 28, 1823-Feb. 10, 1829.
Pius VIII -- March 31, 1829-Nov. 30, 1830.
Gregory XVI -- Feb. 2, 1831-June 1, 1846.
Pius IX -- June 16, 1846-Feb. 7, 1878.
Leo XIII -- Feb. 20, 1878-July 20, 1903.
Pius X -- Aug. 4, 1903-Aug. 20, 1914.
Benedict XV -- Sept. 3, 1914-Jan. 22, 1922.
Pius XI -- Feb. 6, 1922-Feb. 10, 1939.
Pius XII -- March 2, 1939-Oct. 9, 1958.
John XXIII -- Oct. 28, 1958-June 3, 1963.
Paul VI -- June 21, 1963-Aug. 6, 1978.
John Paul I -- Aug. 26-Sept. 28, 1978.
John Paul II -- Oct. 16, 1978-April 2, 2005.
Benedict XVI -- April 19, 2005-
----------------
Thousands of Gamblers Score on Pope Vote
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Betting.html
April 19, 2005
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:00 p.m. ET
DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) -- When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected
pope, he was hardly the only winner. Thousands worldwide placed bets
on him through the Web -- and an inspired few hundred even correctly
guessed he'd take the name Benedict.
Among a handful of Internet-based bookmakers who offered odds on the
next pope, the biggest player was Paddy Power PLC, the No. 1 bookie in
Ireland, which has taken bets on John Paul's successor for the past
five years.
Minutes after Benedict XVI appeared in St. Peter's Square, Paddy Power
was collecting -- or paying out -- on more than 10,000 bets totaling
more than $260,000.
The biggest winners: Someone who put down $1,050 Saturday on a
Ratzinger victory at odds of 6 to 1, which meant a payout of $7,350;
and somebody else who waged $260 on the new pontiff's taking Benedict,
which at 3-to-1 odds meant $1,050 back. The money kept flowing in
until the white smoke appeared.
''We were kind of hoping the conclave would run for two weeks,'' said
Paddy Power, spokesman for the firm of the same name, in a telephone
interview from Rome, where the company has been promoting its Vatican
specials.
Paddy Power, fellow Dublin betting site Intrade and three British
bookies -- [1]betfair.com, Pinnacle and William Hill -- all rated
Ratzinger either as favorite or second-favorite. His victory meant
they all still made a profit, because of all the other bets placed on
a field of more than 100 other candidates, but only a modest one.
''If a real long shot had won it, we'd have taken home the full 200
grand,'' Power said, referring to his firm's total of bets, in euros,
on a field of about 90 cardinals.
As it was, he said, the backers of Ratzinger would get more than
$162,000, while those who backed other winners -- including the name
of Benedict and the successful election on Tuesday -- would take about
$13,000 more, leaving the company a profit of more than $85,000.
Other betting sites had Ratzinger as clear favorite. At Pinnacle, for
instance, he opened two weeks ago at odds of 7 to 1, but those
narrowed to just 3 to 1 by Tuesday.
At Paddy Power, Ratzinger was once listed at odds of more than 20 to
1. Since John Paul's death, Ratzinger had surged ahead of initial
favorite Dionigi Tettamanzi of Italy. But the star then rose of
Nigeria's Francis Arinze, pushing Ratzinger back into second; Arinze
remained No. 2 on other sites.
At the moment white smoke rose in Vatican City, Paddy Power froze
betting with the odds on Arinze at 7 to 2 and Ratzinger at 11 to 2. In
joint third were Tettamanzi and French Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger of
France at 7 to 1.
''The only worse outcome for us would have been if Arinze won,'' Power
said. ''A Lustiger win could have been just as bad for us as Ratzinger
because we took some big bets on him at high odds a week or so ago.''
Paddy Power was the only bookmaker to take bets on the papal name. It
listed Benedict as favorite, just ahead of John Paul.
But Power explained that Benedict was ranked so highly because of its
connections to Lustiger, not Ratzinger. He said St. Benedict had
predicted that the Catholic church one day would elect a former Jew as
pope; Lustiger converted from Judaism.
''Just our luck. Ratzinger got us on that one too,'' he said.
Power said the firm's oddsmakers would take a few days to think up
some new pope-related bets -- such as the chances of Ratzinger's
permitting women into the priesthood. ''It'd be a brave man or woman
who'd put money on that one,'' he said.
------
On the Net: [2]www.paddypower.com
References
1. http://betfair.com/
2. http://www.paddypower.com/
----------------
Events in the Life of Pope Benedict XVI
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pope-Benedict-XVI-Chronology.html
April 19, 2005
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 10:09 p.m. ET
Events in the life of Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI:
------
April 16, 1927: Born in Marktl am Inn in Germany's southern region of
Bavaria near the Austrian border on the day before Easter. Baptized
the same day.
1929: Family moves to town of Tittmoning.
1932: Family moves to Traunstein after his father has conflicts with
local Nazi Party supporters in Tittmoning.
1941: Enrolled against his will in Hitler Youth. Dismissed shortly
afterward because of his intention to study for the priesthood.
1943: Drafted as helper for anti-aircraft unit, serves in battery
defending BMW plant.
1944: Dismissed from unit, but returns home to find draft notice for
forced labor.
1944: Leaves home to dig anti-tank trenches.
1944: Released from labor force and returns home only to receive army
draft notice three weeks later.
1945: Deserts from army and returns home. Captured by Americans as war
ends.
1945: Released from U.S. POW camp, hitches a ride home on milk truck.
1945: Begins study for priesthood in Freising.
1951: Ordained a priest along with his brother Georg.
1953: Receives doctorate in theology, University of Munich.
1959: Begins teaching theology in Bonn, first of several appointments
in German universities.
1969: Leaves University of Tuebingen concerned about student unrest
which had interrupted his lectures with sit-ins. Takes teaching job in
Regensburg in native Bavaria, near his brother.
1977: Elected Archbishop of Munich und Freising.
1977: Elevated to cardinal three months later by Pope Paul VI.
1978: Participated in conclave that elected Pope John Paul II.
1979: Vatican revokes theology teaching license of liberal German
theologian Hans Kueng, who helped Ratzinger get a teaching post at
University of Tuebingen in the 1960s. Ratzinger was sharply critical
of Kueng.
1981: Summoned to Rome as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith under John Paul II.
1985: On behalf of John Paul II, he denounces a work by Leonard Boff,
a Latin American pioneer of Liberation Theology.
1985: Publication of ''The Ratzinger Report.''
1997: Publication of ''Salt of the Earth.''
1998: Publication of ''Milestones. Memoirs: 1927 to 1997.''
1999: Travels to Menlo Park, Calif., for meeting with leaders of
doctrinal committees of bishops conferences.
2000: Publication of ''God and World,'' ''Spirit of the Liturgy.''
2001: Attended Fontgombault Liturgical Conference, France.
2002: Named Dean of the College of Cardinals.
2002: Travels to Spain to preside over the ''Christ: Way, Truth and
Life'' congress at the Catholic University of St. Anthony.
April 13, 2005: Publication of ''Values in a Time of Upheaval.''
April 19, 2005: Elected Pope Benedict XVI.
----------------
AP > Arts > Election of Pope a Hit for TV Networks
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Pope-TV.html
April 19, 2005
Election of Pope a Hit for TV Networks
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:03 p.m. ET
NEW YORK (AP) -- The election of Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday had all
the elements of a hit daytime reality show for television networks:
some comical confusion, anxiety-laden tedium and finally an exciting
payoff.
ABC, CBS and NBC interrupted programming shortly before noon at the
first appearance of smoke billowing from a chimney atop the Sistine
Chapel in Rome, the centuries-old signal of whether the cardinals
meeting inside had elected a pope.
The smoke looked white, meaning Roman Catholics had a new pope.
Or was it?
Bells were supposed to accompany the appearance of white smoke, and
they weren't ringing. It drove the network anchors nuts.
''It continues to amaze me that in this world of high tech ... we have
to find out that somebody is about to assume one of the most important
offices in the world by reading smoke signals,'' said ABC's Charles
Gibson.
Recalled NBC's Brian Williams later: ''I think we came up with more
ways to characterize the color of smoke than I thought humanly
possible before today.''
Gibson couldn't hide his exasperation as the uncertainty stretched
beyond 10 minutes.
''I must say, they're going to have to work on this,'' he said.
(Pope John Paul II's death was announced by e-mail.)
Finally, the crowd in St. Peter's Square roared, noticing the swinging
of a large bell even before it began to peal.
''Habemus Papam!'' read the words on Fox News Channel's screen.
They had a pope. They just didn't know who. And TV networks filled the
time with somewhat aimless talking, with cameras trained on the
Vatican window where a new pope would soon emerge.
''We just saw someone peeking behind the curtain,'' said CBS anchor
Bob Schieffer. It was a false alarm.
Killing time, CBS turned to correspondent Richard Roth in St. Peter's
Square, where he interviewed the waiting faithful on who they expected
would appear.
Finally, the curtains parted, the windows opened and Cardinal Joseph
Ratzinger of Germany was revealed as the new pope. It was a thrilling
television moment.
Guessing correctly in advance, NBC had Martin Savidge stationed in the
new pope's German hometown for a live report on the reaction.
Williams anchored NBC's coverage from the odd location of a makeshift
studio at Oklahoma City's KFOR-TV; he was in the city for
commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the federal building bombing.
Gibson and Schieffer anchored from New York.
Shortly after 1 p.m. Eastern, the broadcast networks left the
post-selection analysis to the cable networks.
--------------------
International > International Special > Last Pope Benedict Focused on
Ending World War I
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/19/international/worldspecial2/19cnd-bene.html
[This is what James J. Martin called "inconvenient history" and has been
forgotten.]
April 19, 2005
Last Pope Benedict Focused on Ending World War I
By [1]TIMOTHY WILLIAMS
The last pope who chose the name Benedict was an Italian noble who
canonized Joan of Arc and spent much of his papacy trying
unsuccessfully to end World War I, which had pitted Europe's Catholics
against one another.
Born Giacomo della Chiesa in Genoa, Italy, Pope Benedict XV served as
pontiff from 1914 to 1922, the second shortest length of time for a
pope in the 20th Century. He was elected in early September, less than
two months after the outbreak of the war - chosen in part, because he
was a trained diplomat who was neutral on the war.
Almost immediately, Benedict XV appealed to the warring sides to make
peace. He pushed for a Christmas Day truce in 1914 that was initially
agreed to by Germany, but rejected by the Allies. His constant calls
for ending the war became so unpopular on both sides that a 1915
agreement between Italy and other Allies contained a secret provision
to ignore papal peace efforts.
By the time he delivered his Plea for Peace in 1917, Benedict XV was
believed by each side to secretly favor the other. His plea for the
end of the war and international arbitration was ignored by the
leaders of the combatants with the exception of President Woodrow
Wilson, who rejected it.
Benedict XV was successful, however, in having disabled prisoners
exchanged via neutral nations and also helped Belgians deported after
the German offensive return home.
When the war finally did end in 1918, Pope Benedict was excluded from
the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, despite his entreaties to be made
part of the talks. Afterward, the pope expressed dissatisfaction with
the terms forced upon Germany.
Benedict XV later helped develop a Code of Canon Law and worked on
behalf of Armenian refugees.
He died of influenza in 1922. Among his last words were, "We offer our
life to God on behalf of the peace of the world."
References
1. http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=TIMOTHY%20WILLIAMS&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=TIMOTHY%20WILLIAMS&inline=nyt-per
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