I think what clinched the deal for Ratzinger was his sermon on relativism at the Mass for the Election of the Supreme Pontiff, where he declared war on modern society: "We are moving toward a dictatorship of relativism that recongnizes nothing definite and leaves one's own ego and one's own desires as the final measure." I am not a Catholic, so my interest in the election of the new pope is that of an observer. But I am keenly interested in the role of religion in society, and I can already see how the choice of Ratzinger will play with the evangelical fundamentalists in the United States. Ratzinger himself used the F-word in his homily:"to have a clear faith according to the church's creed is today often labeled fundamentalism." Ratzinger's election is a setback for the voices of change within the church and a victory for orthodoxy. Politically, Ratzinger is aligned with the neconservatives in the US and he personally undermined the candidacy of John Kerry by sending a letter to US bishops ordering them to deny Communion ot supporters of women's reproductive rights. He sent no such letter concerning supporters of preemptive war or the death penalty. E.J. Dionne sees some parallels between Ratzinger and the neocons:
Ratzinger is a brilliant, tough-minded intellectual who started out as moderately liberal and -- like so many American neoconservatives -- developed a mistrust of the left because of the student revolt of the 1960s. He once said that "the 1968 revolution" turned into "a radical attack on human freedom and dignity, a deep threat to all that is human." The pope knew what he was getting with Ratzinger, and he got what he wanted.
Over at the neocon journal National Review writer Michael Novack is already heralding Ratzinger's absolutism as the salvation for godless America and (especially) Europe.
The culture of relativism invites its own destruction, both by its own internal incoherence and by its defenselessness against cultures of faith.
This is the bleak fate that Cardinal Ratzinger already sees looming before Europe. His fear is that this sickness of the soul will spread.
For Cardinal Ratzinger, moreover, it is not reason that offers a foundation for faith, but the opposite. Historically, it is Jewish and Christian faith in an intelligent and benevolent Creator that gave birth in the West to trust in reason, humanism, science, and progress, and carried the West far beyond the fatalistic limits of ancient Greece and Rome.
It is interesting, however, that theologian Han Küng, who has locked horns with Ratzinger on more than one occasion over the issue of othodoxy, sees a glimmer of hope (for moderation) in the choice of the name Benedict:
Kirchenkritiker Hans Küng zeigte sich von der Wahl enttäuscht. Allerdings gebe der gewählte Name Benedikt XVI. Hoffnung, dass der Papst einen gemäßigten Kurs einschlagen könnte, sagte der Tübinger, dem der Vatikan vor 25 Jahren die Lehrerlaubnis entzog. "Wie bei einem Präsidenten der USA, sollte man einem neuen Papst 100 Lerntage zubilligen." Der neue Pontifex stehe vor einem Berg unerledigter Aufgaben.
Well, let's hope Pope Benedict XVI's first hundred days are more successful than the president's.
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