Academic in St Peter’s shoes

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger has been elected Pope in a relatively brief conclave. Born in Germany in 1927, Cardinal Ratzinger was one of the young theological assistants to the Bishops during Vatican II. He was credited with being one of those, who with his fellow German, Karl Rahner, ensured that Vatican II pointed the church towards the challenge of transforming the world. Karl Rahner, often considered the theologian of Vatican II, would praise Cardinal Ratzinger for his brilliance and academic rigour even if the two sometimes crossed swords.

Ratzinger was considered a radical theologian loved by progressives within the Church, until the students’ revolts which swept through Europe in 1968. These revolts and their aftermath persuaded Ratzinger that the message of Jesus risked being seen only as one out of many truths. It is this which Ratzinger decided was the greatest change both to the church and to the university to which Ratzinger was committed. For him relativism, or “my truth need not be your truth, my standards need not be your standards,” could only lead to a supermarket Catholicism whose beliefs were fashioned by the fads and fancies of the time.

Ratzinger would leave the University and Academia to become the Cardinal and prefect charged by John Paul II with the defence of the Faith. It is as such that he questions a former student of his: Leornado Boff on the popularising of Boff’s serious works to make them accessible to the Latin American revolution. Boff’s serious work would not be banned but it was the banning of his popular work and his silencing which would gain Ratzinger the reputation of being against Liberation theology. In the USA it was Fox’s creationist theology which would be banned. This presupposed that mankind was “good” rather than flawed by original sin.

But it was Ratzinger’s “Dominus Jesus” which would draw him to the attention of the world. Few had read the closely argued document before comments were made. In that document, Ratzinger argued against those who saw the Holy Spirit at work in all religions. For Ratzinger it was the Trinity. It was the saving grace of the Crucifixion which saved the world, was at work in  all religions and was, even if unknowingly, accepted by many in all religions or in none. It was these who were invisible or anonymous Christians. It was this which guaranteed universality. Ratzinger was the architect of the remarkable agreement between Catholics and Lutherans on the question of the Justification by Faith.

He insisted that rites of the Eastern Catholic Churches should be preserved rather than be swallowed by the Roman Rite. It opened the door for reconciliation with the ‘ecclesial communities’; of the Reformation, and makes reconciliation with Orthodox Churches far easier. Some have remarked that as a German Ratzinger was once a member of the Hitlerian Youth Brigade — he was only 18 when the war ended. All however agree that few have been as against anti-Semitism and as propagating, the phrase of “Jews as the elder Brothers of Christians” as has Ratzinger.

Ratzinger is known to be one of those against the war in Iraq. That he has taken the name Benedict XVI indicates that he sees his Pontificate as following Benedict XV, the Pope of Peace who attempted to stop the First World War. We can expect that Pope Benedict XVI will to a large extent follow his friend and mentor John Paul II. There may however be surprises. It will be the first time over a long period that an intellectual and an academic steps into the shoes of Peter the Apostle. It may well be that rigour which the Church needs today. Certainly here in TT where relativism has entered everything from politics to education to culture, Ratzinger may well be very welcome.