I’m not certain which writers he’s thinking of (I haven’t noticed anyone accusing the Pope of being a closet hawk, just a growing satisfaction with Vatican willingness to confront Islam –especially in the repeated call for reciprocal rights. What Western nations grant Muslims in the nature of religious freedom, Muslim nations must grant Christians and other non-Muslims living in their nations. See for example my previous post, or the Pope’s words to Muslim leaders at World Youth Day). But it’s a fair point to note that Benedict’s not by any stretch of the imagination in favor of the war. I’d even go Matera one better and point out it wasn’t just the (to Conservatives) “peacenik” Cardinal Martino who suggested in the run-up to Iraq that there mightn’t any longer be such a thing as Just War. Cardinal Ratzinger said it too. Asked about John Paul II’s opposition to Iraq, he laid out the Holy Father’s spiritual and doctrinal concerns, then added:
The Holy Father's judgment is also convincing from the rational point of view: There were not sufficient reasons to unleash a war against Iraq. To say nothing of the fact that, given the new weapons that make possible destructions that go beyond the combatant groups, today we should be asking ourselves if it is still licit to admit the very existence of a "just war."It’s good to be reminded what the Pope actually says. However, since I detect a rebuke of Catholic Hawks in Matera’s column (said to be first in a series), it might be well to remind the Catholic Doves of a few other things the Pope says. Remember the Kerry Communion kerfluffle in the 2004 campaign? Cardinal Ratzinger was called upon to elucidate Catholic principles for communion distribution for the benefit of our bishops and clergy, and issued an authoritative statement which included the following:
Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.Furthermore, in spite of the tendency of Catholic columnists to proclaim the Iraq war unjust, you will search in vain for any statement where either John Paul II or Benedict XVI go so far. On the contrary, each goes out of his way to be sure we understand that while they emphatically believe what they teach, they are pleading as men of conscience, not giving political commands. In his recent German TV interview, for example, the Pope said:
war is the worst solution for all sides. It brings no good to anyone, not even to the apparent victors. We understand this very well in Europe, after the two world wars. Everyone needs peace.But he also said:
Of course we have no political influence and we don’t want any political power.In the same interview in which he wondered whether there is still Just War, Card. Ratzinger said of John Paul II’s opposition to the Gulf War
Of course, he did not impose this position as doctrine of the Church but as the appeal of a conscience enlightened by faith.In his 2004 exchange of conferences and letters with the President of the Italian Senate (available in book form as Without Roots), Card. Ratzinger writes:
I would like to leave aside the issue of my possible judgment of President Bush’s policies and the war in Iraq, which would require a concrete assessment of the fact and therefore go beyond the scope of the problems that I, as a theologian, can and wish to address publicly.In other words, the Pope –as do we all—has a strong opinion about the war, but he emphatically does not assert for himself what some Catholic doves unhelpfully appear to assert on his behalf: the expertise necessary to make a definitive ruling in a matter outside his expertise and the authority to command political entities.
I say unhelpfully for three reasons. First, while the degree of adherence a lay person ought to have to a Pope’s prudential statements is an important question for Catholics (for a good explanation of Church teaching try this,), it really contributes nothing to understanding how Catholic thought on matters of peace and war applies in the era of terrorism (which is why I so appreciated Fr. Berg’s column the other day). “The Pope said so” is no more helpful or persuasive in the public square than our separated brethren’s claim that Jesus did. If you want to transform the world, you must convince it.
Furthermore, taking Papal political statements at face value is problematic. It ought to engender deeper questions, such as: To what extent might the Pope be conditioned by the effect his words are likely to have on populations (The Pius XII problem)? Or: to what extent are differences between the Pope and the President conditioned by the distinction in their roles? That is, the Pope is responsible for souls in the entire world, and particularly Catholic souls. The President's chief responsibility is to defend his people. How are we to think about the tension between those roles? Take the case of the famous picture of Pius XII blessing Mussolini’s troops from the Loggia. Should Catholics at the time have interpreted that as Pius’ approval of the aims of the Axis powers? Should they therefore have editorialized against entering WWII? Did Pius' public action in this case reflect his opinions?(We know that behind the scenes Pius was working to undermine the Nazis and saved some 860,000 Jews.)
Just as a thought experiment, what if Benedict the XVI privately agreed with Newt Gingrich’s view of the world? Is it at all imaginable he would ever say so? A friend writes:
No. He can’t. That’s not his role… He will go down in a blaze of fire as the Taliban overruns St. Peter’s, crying out for peace and dialogue… that’s his prophetic role….I think that’s right –but you can see what a problem that poses for those who are trying to support the Holy Father’s mission. It's not obvious that every statement should be taken at face value, and Catholic “doves” owe it to us to wrestle with this question and elucidate their moral reasoning about right action, rather than merely pointing out who disagrees with the Pope.
Finally, I think most Catholic pundits read the Pope’s pronouncements in a rather shallow way. We have to strive to really listen and understand why the Holy Father says what he says. When we do that I think we find zero instances of the Pope saying: "Bush: do this," but instead a number of layers of very carefully worded levels of meaning. To take the German television example, the blogosphere broke out into a heated debate (good summary of Ratzinger's thought here) about whether the Pope was a pacificist because of his remarks. Everyone is so quick to read a political prescription for Bush & Blair into the Pope's every comment, but he never addressed the political question at all! His appeal was to the laity:
we do want to appeal to all Christians and to all those who feel touched by the words of the Holy See, to help mobilize all the forces that recognize how war is the worst solution for all sidesAnd further on:
There’s a strong Christian community in Lebanon, there are Christians among the Arabs, there are Christians in Israel. Christians throughout the world are committed to helping these countries that are dear to all of us. There are moral forces at work that are ready to help people understand how the only solution is for all of us to live together. These are the forces we want to mobilize: it’s up to politicians to find a way to let this happen as soon as possible and, especially, to make it last.See how the Pope prescinds from political prescriptions? When he calls for peace, he’s primarily appealing to the “creative minorities” whose dynamic, on-the-ground Christian witness can transform hearts. Similarly, he repeatedly teaches that it harms the Church when bishops try to focus too much on specific questions that are better left to the laity. In Without Roots, Cardinal Ratzinger writes:
The Church and its theology have wasted too much time on small back-guard skirmishes, getting lost in debates over details, and they have not invested enough effort in asking the basic questions. . . .what makes the world cohere? Does matter create reason?. . .The basic questions. That’s what you’ll find Benedict addressing, and that is the significance of his appointing Cardinal Bertone as Sec. of State --the thing that's made "Hawks" so happy of late. Not a change in political outlook, but a change in focus on the Church’s role in political matters. It is not piety, but the worst form of clericalism, to suggest that the Pope qua Pope has the fullness of facts at his command to be able to rule definitively on various and sundry practical matters –and it may actually harm the Church to try to get him to do so. The Pope's project is to get us all to reflect on the nature of existence --and thus to equip us to be mature Christians who can be society's conscience on these matters. He has no intention of supplanting the just role of the laity in ordering society.
