Benedict’s Refresher Course

“Nowadays especially, with the complexity of our problems, Christianity often becomes so complicated for us that we can no longer see the forest for the trees. It is a matter of being led back to the simple heart of it, not to anything else, but to the essentials, to conversion, to faith, hope, and love.”



Pope Benedict XVI said that a couple of years before becoming pope. With the first anniversary of his election coming up April 19, he appears to be living it out.

People have called Benedict surprising. Some mean it as a compliment, others are voicing disappointment. But the surprise in both cases is that he has turned out to be very unlike the pre-election caricatures depicting him as a Grand Inquisitor who would make heads roll.

Still, for those who took the trouble to listen to what Joseph Ratzinger was saying all those years, the pontificate of Benedict XVI ought to come as no surprise. This former professor is now hard at work delivering a refresher course on the basics of Christian faith.

If there was any doubt about that, Pope Benedict's first encyclical — Deus Caritas Est — should have settled the matter. “God Is Love” — what could be more basic than that? And unless I miss my guess, Benedict has a compelling reason in mind for making the point.

It's this. Many people today — including many Catholics — have strayed so far from the truth, done such an effective job of closing their ears and hardening their hearts to the Word of God and the teaching of the Church, that it's a waste of time that risks being counterproductive to confront them yet again with hard truths. (The Church's teaching about sexual morality is an instance, though hardly the only one.)

So, what's a conscientious pope to do? Another pope might have another answer. Benedict's appears to be: Go back to first principles — God is love — and begin the long, slow process of leading people who've strayed from truth back to the fullness of faith.

Pope Benedict said as much a few weeks ago in his address to the plenary assembly of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which he headed for a quarter-century.

“Jesus Christ, who is the fullness of the truth, draws to Himself the heart of each person, enlarges it, and fills it with joy…. Thus, service to the faith, which is a witness to the One Who is the entire Truth, is also a service to joy, and this is the joy that Christ desires to spread in the world.”

From this point of view, he told the members and staff of the CDF, “your doctrinal ministry can appropriately be defined as 'pastoral.'”

From Lefebvrists on the far Right to Hans Kung on the far Left, Benedict XVI has pursued a policy of reconciliation. Will this emphasis on love, truth, and joy work? I have no idea, and I suspect Pope Benedict doesn't either. But it probably has more chance of working than the take-no-prisoners approach some conservatives were looking for a year ago.

There's a name for it — Christian. Over lunch a couple of weeks ago after a trip to Rome, I was telling a friend that — as others have remarked — Pope Benedict in person visibly radiates serenity and joy. My friend, a Jewish convert to Catholicism, thought about that for a moment and then said, “I guess that's what you'd expect a Christian to do, isn't it?”

To which only one answer is possible: I guess it is.

Russell Shaw is a freelance writer from Washington, D.C. You can email him at RShaw10290@aol.com.

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Russell Shaw is a freelance writer from Washington, DC. He is the author of more than twenty books and previously served as secretary for public affairs of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops/United States Catholic Conference.

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