Obviously I type way to slow for breaking news threads :D.
- Tamerlane
Is picking Ratzo, the Grand Inquisitor, a kissoff to Catholics in the Northern Hemisphere? JPII did so much to push people like me away I cannot imagine how bad it will get for moderates and liberals now.
[Miss Hoover (Dr Hibbert?)]
He’s evil, but he’ll die soon.
[/some Simpsons character]
Eh. If the Vatican wants to continue to marginalize itself, that’s what they’ll do. And if their edicts lead to a death or two, who am I to contradict them?
I suspect a sea of eyes are rolling in Europe right now.
Daniel
The Episcopal Church welcomes you: bells, smells, apostolic succession, very little dogma, and tolerance for a wide variety of social and theological perspectives! 
Well, on the nationality aspect, I was indeed almost certain it would be a European. The time was not ripe.
Disappointed? No, can’t really say so. It was pretty clear since the mid-90s that the doctrinal conservative wing not only had a lock on the power structure, but was already starting to move in the direction of Reaction.
The Cardinals were not going to elect anyone but an orthodox conservative: that was a given. They were well aware it meant that the institution would continue to catch, erm, hell, over it; and they knew that nobody could match JP2’s charisma and likability in the face of that. So, they said let’s go ahead and call on an intellectual/doctrinal strongman; since the hits will be coming anyway, they might as well put in the guy who can lay out the theological smackdown.
Interestingly, it does sustain the tradition of seeking to alternate pastoral-centric with theological-centric pontificates. Can’t really picture Ben16 headlining the World Youth Rally quite as succesfully as JP2, but you bet you’ll get any theological question clarified fast, loud, and hard…
Guin, it was Pius IX who started off as a liberal and turned into a hardcore conservative – funny how realizing you are one of the targets of the revolution changes your point of view.
Correction-it was Pius IX who started ex cathedra.
I for one am extremely glad they picked this guy.
Although picking someone like the Honduras candidate seems a nice idea, picking such an unbelievably arch-conservative is bound to set of schisms and rebellions in the Catholic church that it will not be able to contain.
Eg the priests-paedophilia scandal: had that happend earlier in JP’s reign, when his popularity/adulation/adoration was not nearly so high as it became for such a long-serving, elderly, ailing old man, I don’t think he would have slid out of things as easily as he did.
No one - yet - has anywhere near the (albeit misguided) trust/adoration for Ratzinger, the already reformist elements are going to be fucking incensed, and the entire Church’s credibility is going to continue to slide.
sets up deckchair outside the Vatican, sits back, waits for fireworks (even if it takes a couple of years)
Ratzinger’s WWII history the Sunday Times:
Any chance he took a shot at local flyboy Dovid Simmons?
You just know Jack Chick is gonna have a field day with this guy. I know the Hitler Youth stuff is minor-most kids in Germany at that time were members-but Jacky-boy is gonna blow it all out of proportion.
Oh, I figured I would have to wait awhile before the new guy did something I didn’t like, since I would have never heard of him.
I was wrong. My pitting is named Pope Ratzi, true, he deserted, but it really is a shortening of his anme, and too good to give up. Also, how about those poor South Americans rooting for one of their own?
And this is a good thing because…?
Not that the thought - that a Pope Ratzinger might bring down the church - hadn’t occurred to me (with just a little pleasure) in my more anti-theist moments. But back in reality a widening gulf between the church and the secular West is not a good thing. IMHO it just makes the true believers even crazier. And personally I would very much like the priests in Africa to stop saying that condoms don’t prevent AIDS. etc.
I was all set to go Episcopalian, since our local one has a Mary shrine AND is just down the street from a Dairy Queen (ice cream’s answer to the Episcopalian Church ) when my daughter started going to an ELCA church and since I had to drop her off and pick her up it was less trouble to just stay. So if you get tired of English women, English food*, and your nose being offended by frankincense we have much the same theology plus Scandanavian women and look for any excuse for a potluck by people who can cook.
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- This was in no way a comparison of the quality of English women to the quality of English food. It is just that life is a smorgasbord and one shouldn’t limit what’s on ones plate to one entree, no matter how charming and delicately beautiful she, I mean it, I mean you know what I mean, may be.
Do I know how to weasel or what?
Plus they chose one of the oldest of these they could, so they can change course if they have to in ten years or so. That’s the thing that struck me as I was listening to the BBC coverage: Ratzinger is an extremely combative choice, representing sort of a “you got a problem with this? come and get us” stance, but he isn’t going to be in office very long at all. If it works (from their point of view), they look like geniuses. If it goes all pear-shaped, it won’t be very long before they can make a correction.
Very interesting, and a very political selection.
There’s a new Pope?
What happened to the old one?
Pat Buchanan is probably crappin’ his pants for joy about now.
It will be an interesting experiment. The conservatives seem to think that the decline in the Church in the US and Europe comes from it being too liberal (despite all these years of JPII). If the decline continues with Benedict XVI, that would be evidence against it. I guess it should have been no surprise that a bunch of cardinals appointed by JPII would pick his right hand man so quickly.
Ah he won’t be so bad. He at least ought to bring the organization up to the 16th or 17th century.
In Europe, yes, although a conservative pope will probably be welomed in the developing world, which is where the Catholic church is expanding.
Personally, I’m very disappointed. Reading a little about Ratzinger, he seems unlikey to concede that use of a small piece of latex is less of a sin than risking the spread of Aids.
The Catholic Churh under the auspices of John Paul II has become stronger, more international and universal while mainatining a traditional conservative ideaology. It is far from becoming marginalized, if anything the reverse is true.
The thing I find so amazing is the predicatbility of the selection. Nearly every analyst I’ve read/heard so far had put their safest bet on Ratzinger. Does not the sheer lack of surprise suggest something rather significant?
Unless, of course, you are a conservative priest in Connecticut…
I didn’t hold out much hope that Ratzinger would be chosen - I had my hopes on Arinze from Africa - but I’m well-pleased. BenXVI is theologically astute and scripturally grounded. I hope that he continues JPII’s crusade against political injustice, war and state-sponsored violence, moral relativism and sexual permissiveness.
Perhaps ‘crusade’ is not the best choice of words… call it ‘campaign.’