Ratzinger elected pope

[winterbadger]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4462077.stm

Ah, how long has it been since the head of the Holy Office of the Inquisition was actually elected pope?

I forsee a schism in the church during this papacy, as liberal catholics from North America and western and eastern Europe and conservatives from Latin America, Africa, and southern Europe pull the church entirely apart. I don't think progressive catholics are willign to give up on the church, but I don't think they're willing to accept the sort of iron hand they're probably going to get from Benedict XVI. Perhaps the conservative faction of the Anglican church can swap places with liberal catholicism, and Roman Catholicism can uphold the standard of blinkered, stubborn, doctrinnaire, bloody-minded antiEnlightenment while the rest of the catholic church moves forward.

Comments

[kathygnome.livejournal.com]

I can't see a schism. The heirarchy are with Rome.

I wonder what the ownership issues are with possibly individual parishes leaving. I know a big thing here in Mass is the Diocese closing and selling off churches to pay off their pedophilia debts. (And if those parishes on the auction block happen to be the troublesome ones that forced them to deal with the issues, well, there won't be any frowns among the heirarchy.)

Unless he starts refusing communion to people, I can't even see people leaving the church. Most American Catholics I know have an utterly protestant world view. If you tell them they don't have the right to interpret scripture for themselves, but that is a privilege reserved to the heirarchy, not only do they not get upset, but they don't even believe that is the church teaching.

[winterbadger]

The hierarchy are with Rome.

The hierarchy usually are with the conservative portion of an organization. But large swathes of the laity and large portions of the clergy are no longer accepting of the conservative teachings of the church. There was an organized protest by a group of nuns on the steps of the ?Chicago? cathedral on the day the conclave bagan, demanding that the church open itself up to full particpation by women. This pope will never do that, and a larger and larger portion of his flock will reject the church as a governing body the longer he does so.

Unless he starts refusing communion to people, I can't even see people leaving the church.

He advocated denying communion to people; as pope, he will probably do so.

And I don't expect people to leave teh church; the church is leaving them. People will just move forward and leave the church behind if it insists on remaining mired in, frankly, darkness and ignorance.

but they don't even believe that is the church teaching.

That's just my point; they *know* that that's the church's teaching. Beleive me, American catholics have been struggling with this for decades. They don't just stick their heads in the sand and pretend reality isn't there. What they do is just go on with their lives and, gradually, more and more, ignore the teachings of the Vatican for those that are arrived at national, diocesan, and parish level.

When I say schism, don't expect a big display of banners and robed chuchmen turning candles upside down and ripping up parchment. It's a much more insidious thing. People in the 1960s really were afraid that a Catholic president would feel obliged to obey the Church's teachings and the dictates of the pope, and that wasn't entirely ignorant feearmongering. Most catholics, including intelligent intellectual ones, felt a strong bond of obedience to Rome. When Bush tried to play the Catholic card in the last election, it fizzled; people pretty much know that Catholics in this country have developed an individual conscience. As such, they will have less and less need of Rome. If dioceses start managing their own affairs, instead of turning to Rome for support or guidance, that will be what in the analytical class I just finished we call a warning indicator.

Roman Catholicism in this country has been in a protected struggle within itself for a good part of the last century. This century, and the election of this poope, may see that struggle subside as the NorthAmerican church just gives up on trying to engage with Rome and goes its own way.

[winterbadger]

for "protected" read "protracted"

[robbysmom.livejournal.com]

This is not a choicwe of a church willing (yet) to eb a medum for the lossing of the Holy Spirit in the world, in my opinion-- if it ever was.

I foudn a home in the Episcopal Church for a reason, and the unwelcoming views of the Roman Curia were amogn them.

[vikingcat.livejournal.com]

For some reason Blackadder's line about German having no word for "fluffy" keeps running through my head.

[winterbadger]

No word for "fluffy" but one for the much more complex concept of "taking pleasure in another's pain"; those wacky Germans.

I've been debating which Blackadder series might be most appealing to poliscidiva; any guesses? They're all a bit _historical_ (though only in the losest sense) which I fear may make them less interesting to her.

[blueinva.livejournal.com]

Got to be 2, it's the best as far as comic timing goes...

[vikingcat.livejournal.com]

I was going to say III, but II could work as well. I actually brought my Blackadder Goes Forth DVD (and Fawlty Towers--there seem to be a lot of gaps in N.'s britcom experience) along on one of our trips, but we never got past watching Sportsnight. (The key for that series, of course, is to watch the Private Plane episode after the others, since as it is perhaps the funniest half hour of TV ever, the rest of the series appears anticlimactic in contrast. My USAF students in the pre-RAND days couldn't get enough of Sqn Ldr Lord Flasheart.)

[vikingcat.livejournal.com]

I think that it's moves towards liberalization that would be more likely to generate schisms by provoking the ire of traditionalists (as among the Anglicans). With a conservative hardliner I'd expect the more natural consequence would be contraction of the church (like the Ninotchka line about Stalinism leading to fewer but better Russians).

Speaking of the USSR, I think the last time the head of the Inquisition became the leader of an organization on this scale was probably when Andropov was selected to succeed Brezhnev and sort out the Soviet Union's problems by taking a harder line with the slackers.

[winterbadger]

[Andropov] And that was more of a John Paul I situation, at least in the practical outcome...