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Habebamus Papam, Habemus Papam, Habemus "Papitas"

It is not often that the Dog gets to display his learning in so forward a fashion, and even less often that he is granted the lead article. However, the times call for Latin, so Latin it is.

We had a Pope. Boy, did we have a Pope! In what is sure to go down in history as one of the most magnificent of pontificates, John Paul II, already known as “the Great” by many, guided God’s Church out of the wreckage of the 20th century, wreckage with which he was all too familiar, and into the unknown that is the 21st.
    The Great. That title must confuse many of the chattering class, who considered him a throwback to a pre-Vatican II sensibility. To those who oppose the Church, and thus the Pope, on the predictable issues, he was little more than a media-savvy, charismatic figure from a backward country with decidedly backward views on all the most pressing issues of the day, such as sex, sex, and sex. With their fixation on sex, one wonders why such people are molders of opinion? It’s like having a junior varsity football team set the agenda for the developed world.
    And, yet, great he was and will be known as long after their chattering has ceased. I have the book to prove it. At my left hand as I type these words sits a copy of a volume titled, you guessed it, John Paul the Great. Published out of England in a collaborative effort by the Catholic Truth Society & The Catholic Herald, it is a collection of essays by noted Catholics on JPII’s pontificate.
    The impression that a quick perusal of its contents leaves is that this John Paul, reviled for his narrow, anti-woman, anti-sex, anti-Vatican II, anti-et cetera attitudes, was, in fact, none of these things. Rather, he was a Catholic. Remarkable isn’t it?
    And he was only anti-anything because he was pro-one thing. Christ. John Paul II proposed to the world nothing less than Christ, and he made that proposal so attractive to a world gone mad in following everything but the One thing essential.
    He was no more anti-woman than the Church that has been the best friend the fairer sex has had for the last 2000 years. He was no more anti-sex than the Church that recognizes the lifelong love between a man and a woman, including its physical expression, to be a sacrament, i.e., a conduit of God’s grace. And he was no more anti-Vatican II than the God in whose name the Council was called. In fact, Karol Wojtyla, in a very real sense, personifies Vatican II. It is his Council. He has interpreted it for the rest of us poor sinners in order that we might endeavor to live it.
    And he accomplished much else as well. By now the panegyrics have been penned, and many of you are familiar with the life and times of this great man. However, a book still worth picking up is the above-mentioned John Paul the Great, for in a collection of nine essays, his achievements and charism are detailed in the following areas: the new ecclesial movements, Mary and her role in the Church, “making saints,” the dignity of women, theology of the body (human sexuality), the social teaching of the Church, his role as teacher and pastor with an emphasis on his encyclicals, and his role as the authentic interpreter of Vatican II.
    But what of its famous “Spirit?” You know, “the spirit of Vatican II,” that dandy little poltergeist that has haunted Catholic liturgical celebrations and religious education since the late 60s; that cute little catchphrase that has been uttered incessantly by the heretics and apostates that have been ensconced in the chanceries, in control of the universities and in front of the camera for the last three decades; that lie, that fraud, that imposter, that demon, that unclean spirit. Yes, you remember it. Well, it’s been exorcised. At least the job was begun by John Paul; it will be finished by Benedict, and the “Spirit of Vatican II” supplanted by an authentic implementation of the Council’s vision.
    Interestingly enough, about five years ago, I was discussing Pope John Paul II with a young priest friend of mine. This priest thought then and probably still does that John Paul laid the groundwork for a solid interpretation of the Council in conformity with Church Tradition, doing so through his incredible output of encyclicals, letters and other teachings. He thought that the next Pope would be the “hammer,” the one chosen by God to clean His Church. And, lo and behold, the Cardinals went and got a German. Of course, just as all “peoples” have their foibles, the Germans are known for some characteristically German failings; laxity, however, is not one of them. That does not bode well for the misnamed “progressive” wing of the Church.
    I believe it was Saint Peter Canisius who, preaching in and around what is today Germany during the also-misnamed Protestant Reformation, earned the nickname “the hammer of heretics.” As much as the Pope’s choice of the name of Benedict anticipates a pontificate that will be world-changing in its effects, I have to confess that Pope Peter, after the Rock and the Hammer, would have been to my liking as well.
    Regardless of the name, our new Pope has some enormous shoes to fill. John Paul II left the footprints of the fisherman on the Church and the world. We won’t see the likes of him again until, God willing, we do so in Heaven. We had a Pope and what a Pope we had. Requiescat in pace.

Habemus Papam! We have a Pope! And what a Pope we have. The humble German genius. The panzerkardinal, the Vatican Watchdog (I like that!), the Grand Inquisitor. (As an aside, the Catholic press has been busily trying to correct the negative “spin” that Benedict is getting because of his reputation as a “hard-liner.” Clarifying the true nature of a man is to be welcomed. Nobody likes to be caricatured. However, some part of me feels like saying, “thou doth protest too much.” For, rest assured, orthodox Catholics the world over are not rejoicing because this Pope loves Mozart and is humble and lovable.)
    However he is described by those who love him or those who hate him, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger was the man for the job. While the secular pundits were busy handicapping the race and musing about how the next Pope would be dispensing rubbers from the Popemobile and laying the groundwork for a female clergy, the Holy Spirit was at work, moving the hearts and minds of the Cardinal-electors in one clear decisive direction, that already trod by John Paul.
    Speaking of the secular pundits, the Dog must confess that he took an inordinate amount of glee, one might even say perverse pleasure, in the aftermath of the announcement of the new Pope. The collective gasp of horror that went up from the mouths of those liberal “Catholics” that have been framers of opinion in the States for a long time was music to my ears.
    We all saw the aftershocks on the talk shows. Sister Joan Chittister was there to remind us that this Pope Benedict was really taking the wrong name because his thought is not in harmony with the original Saint Benedict. Charles Curran, once famous for his defiance of the encyclical Humanae Vitae (can we still call him Father?) cropped up from his post-in-exile that is Southern Methodist University to lament the choice.
    The criticism came not only from the left. Pope Bill O’Reilly was shocked that a monsignor on his show had the temerity to suggest that this Pope just might excommunicate Catholic politicians who support abortion rights. Chris Matthews explained that he just doesn’t “get” the stricture against birth control and, of course, noted that most American Catholics don’t get it either. In watching this cavalcade of “Catholics,” it occurred to me that we are not blessed with one Pope; we’re burdened with numerous. Habemus “papitas!” We have many little popes, apparently. Way too many.
    And that’s the trouble with these vicars in miniature. They themselves are the ones who “don’t get it,” but does that stop them from offering their opinions “ex cathedra” as it were? Of course not. Catholicism is the one topic on which everyone is entitled to have an opinion. Don’t know the difference between the Immaculate Conception and the Virgin Birth? Doesn’t matter. Never gone to the trouble to read the Church Fathers or even the writings of John Paul II? No problem. In fact, you just may qualify to host an internationally broadcast special on the Catholicism of Pope John Paul.
    I half expected to hear some earnest American announcer wonder why on earth someone would choose the name of Benedict when everyone knows that Americans would immediately think of Benedict Arnold. “Tell me Father, do you think that the new Pope considered that many Americans would react negatively to the name Benedict? Did he also consider that American Catholics may put two and two together and that the issues of the Pope’s name and birth control may just be the straws that break the camel’s back?”
    The orthodox priests, and happily there were some on the panels of most networks, must have felt like teachers dealing with a group of particularly dimwitted students. “Um, no Katie. I don’t think those two things crossed his mind. That’s a very good question, though.”
    Hoping to be invited back, most of them seemed able to refrain from rolling their eyes, at least on camera.
As for the Pope’s selection of a name, I was bewildered for some time by the emphasis on the previous Pope Benedict. Clearly, Cardinal Ratzinger was making a grander statement than that. Viewing the present age as another time in history when the very foundations of civilization are crumbling all around us, the Pope clearly views it as his task to rebuild the Church and, thus, Europe, as St. Benedict once did. A wonderful quotation from the book After Virtue by Alisdair MacIntyre has been making the rounds of the Internet and finding its way into commentaries. (I don’t know who made the original connection, but he should be thanked.)
What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual and moral life can be sustained through the new dark ages which are already upon us. And if the tradition of the virtues was able to survive the horrors of the last dark ages, we are not entirely without grounds for hope. This time however the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have been governing us for quite some time. And it is our lack of consciousness of this that constitutes part of our predicament. We are waiting not for a Godot, but for another-doubtless very different-St. Benedict. (p. 263)

These sentences hold the key to the name of our new Pope. They may also hold the key to a program of the reevangelization of culture through the above described small communities. Time will tell.
    Finally, while I’ve enjoyed learning more about Pope Benedict’s kindness and his culture, his shyness and studiousness, I have to confess that the original image of the PanzerKardinal doesn’t really bother me. In fact, to paraphrase a famous line and apply it to the heterodox public Catholic opinion makers, the Dog says, “Excommunicate ‘em all. Let God sort ‘em out.” For their own good and for the good of the Church.
    May God continue to bless our Popes, ourselves and the Holy Catholic Church! Habemus Papam!

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