RECEIVE THE BENEDICTION

If you’ve been reading this blog long enough, you know I’m Lutheran, and you would correctly deduce that therefore the election of a new pope is not a tremendously significant event in my life. Like many commentators, I’ve been more amused than bemused at the number of people who seem genuinely shocked that Benedict XVI comes to the papacy with a reputation as a doctrinal conservative, one given to the defense of traditional faith.

Just how, exactly, do you think you get to be pope, anyway? By promising to spit in the holy water? Or by trying to sell the actual Virgin Mary to GoldenPalace.com?

Equally amazing is this breathless missive, in which some surprise is expressed that a 78-year-old man with a history of stroke believes that his life expectancy may be measured in years, not decades. I dunno, seems pretty reasonable to me.

Cardinal Ratzinger may not have been the preferred choice of the punditocracy, and he certainly wasn’t the choice of many American Catholics, because, as one Catholic theology professor put it, ‘Ratzinger is the one who “basically said no” to further discussion of hot-button issues such as the ordination of women, priestly celibacy, birth control and homosexuality.’ There is, of course, no greater sin in the secular/ecumenical world than refusing to discuss these issues, preferrably until one reaches the correct opinions. But even non-ecumenical American Catholics are not thrilled with Ratzinger’s elevation. Heck, almost a decade ago, Andrew Greeley’s novel White Smoke ended with the hateful, putrid Ratzinger caricature losing out to a youngish, progressive Latino cardinal . . . whom I believe chose the name Benedict, though I may be wrong. So it really wasn’t supposed to be like this; with the end of John Paul II’s papacy, the Roman church was supposed to enter a new, more progressive era.

Right concept, wrong direction, and wrong end of the papacy.

In fact, I think John Paul II’s papacy gave tremendous credibility to the notion that Christianity itself is growing more conservative as the distance from both Vatican II and the tremendous societal upheaval of the 1960s increases. JPII’s papacy wasn’t the end of an era, but rather the beginning of one–one in which the Roman church would care less and less about the world’s approval. This change made strange bedfellows of the Roman church and conservative American protestants, as the two groups found they had more in common with each other than either group had with the great mushy middle of American Protestantism and the last twitching remnants of European Christianity. Consequently, it’s fair to say that the social-justice-based ecumenical movement, which has been with us for about fifty years, got completely overshadowed by an ad hoc coalition of disparate religious factions. The Catholics and evangelicals have created more true church unity than the World Council of Churches could ever dream of–this despite the fact that the Catholic/evangelical alliance hasn’t produced any formalized agreements like we mainline Protestants are fond of.

Benedict XVI may, by his own admission, be a transitional pope, a placeholder who keeps the throne of the fisherman warm while the next pope passes through the refiner’s fire. But we need only look to his election, and John Paul II’s papacy, as signs that modernism and postmodernism are both dead within the church. Global Christianity is not behind the times, but rather ahead of them. What is needed now in church leadership is theological clarity, but not merely that; as we are increasingly able to accept that the ages have not been wrong about everything, the quality of continuity becomes more useful. It will not do to question authority just for the purpose of questioning authority. Today’s world has demonstrated that the only people who still say “don’t follow leaders” are the ones who want to lead you themselves.

SPOT THE DOOFUS

It shouldn’t be too hard . . .