A tactless pontiff

A tactless pontiff
I like many others felt heatened by Joseph Ratzinger's choice of Benedict as his papal name. Given his reputation many felt that Innocent or maybe Julius might have been a more fitting papal role model.

I like taking the micky, and like a certain oboist I don't always keep mine zipped up. Now I can't stop referring to the ex Joseph Ratzinger as Pope Benny. Some readers of my blog may be just old enough to remember Benny, the slow-witted drooling farm-hand on ATV's Crossroads. Benny had a major impact on me as I grew up. One might say he helped shape my personality and intellect. I was reminded of my debt to Benny the other night when a Catholic bishop from Birmingham came on BBC's Newsnight to defend Pope Benny.

I have read Benny's address from Regensburg and there isn't a word in it about Miss Dianne - that's gratitude. My initial response to it is that it is a very reasonably argued piece. In fact, it's so reasonable it's boring. It would make a fine paper in some dusty old Zeitschrift, buried deep in the stacks of a German university library. But it had a far wider audience, and Benny should have been aware of this. He might have hoped that some of his hearers had fallen asleep during its delivery. But that is a luxury only senior lecturers and professors can afford.

I've never been a supporter of Joseph Ratzinger. He has many fine personal qualities, not least a love of music. But because of his own theological certainties he has often been a cold, heartless disciplinarian. Part of his belief system is that the western, so-called Christian world is intellectually superior to others. I don't share such a belief. Yet even Ratzinger does not see such superiority as being based on silly notions of race. There is no prejudice. He is a reactionary but no bigot. He's too much of an intellectual for that, unlike many of those who danced and sang at his election but who have been rather disappointed because the Vatican's enforcer has so far failed to stamp out all testimony of the humane in the Catholic church.

He intended his remarks to be critical of an aspect of Islam. Some might say he was entitled to make them, but he should have thought of the context of presen-day realities. I''ll fight to the death for my right of free speech, but who am I? An unknown geek in front of a computer somewhere. A lecturer or professor in some German university or seminary might have been able to say what the pope said. No one would report it. But the pope is the head of the biggest religious sect in the world. If he mumbled something to himself while playing Mozart no one would hear it, But this was a public occasion. The world is beset by tension between Christianity and Islam, much of it deliberalty heightened and manufactured. Surely even Joseph Ratzinger knows this? Or does he believe that, like some Irish bishop, he can say and do anything and anyone, in defiance of the world, secure that any opposition can be silenced with a swing of the crozier? Could it be that he is showing a trait of devil-nay-care stubbornness typical, according to myth, of Bavarians? ... Das ist so typisch Bay'risch nicht waht?

It reminds me of a joke I once heard. Most things do. In the mid 1970s the Irish Republic established diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. Two Foreign ministry officials, one Irish, the other Russian, were discussing freedom of speech.
"In Ireland" said the Irish official "there is complete freedom of expression. I could stand in the middle of Dublin's O'Connell Street and proclaim that Dr Garret FitzGerald [then Ireland's Foreign Minister] is a buffoon and a lunatic. Nothing would happen to me."
"It is the same in my country" replied the Russian. "I could stand in the middle of Moscow's Red Square, proclaiming that Dr Fitzgerald was a buffoon and a lunatic. Absolutely nothing would happen to me."

The pope stated that he is opposed to the use of force in attempts to promote religion. Would this not have been a fine opportunity to condemn the wanton barbarity of the Crusades then? The destruction of life and culture carried on during La Reconquista in Spain? Or might that have offended too many of his friends who do the work of God? Or better still would it not have been high time to adopt the good husband's approach to the past? Be like dad and keep mum.

Benny has now apologised, and I believe he is sincerely contrite. But the damage has been done. He spoke much about reason. Surely he knows that the world is not a reasonable place, least of all universities.