Two Popes

[peary1]

There is a great deal of debate on this forum (often VERY heated) between Catholics who consider themselves loyal to the Holy Father. I wonder how much of this is a result of a “tale of two Popes.”

Eaamon Duffy (Oxford University) writes the following in “Ever Directed Towards The Lord.” I wonder if readers here are interested in commenting:

“Joseph Ratzinger is both more theologically sophisticated than his predecessor, and a good deal less religiously adventurous. John Paul II was a stout defender of tradition, yet he was untroubled by post-conciliar liturgical discontinuities which so disturb his successor, and he thought nothing of drastically recasting two of the most precious devotional treasures of the Catholic Church. He blithely added an entirely new set of ‘mysteries’ or themes to the Rosary, and he dared to revise the number and subjects even of the Stations of the Cross, representations of which adorn the walls of every Catholic church in the world, eliminating much loved by apocryphal characters like Veronica, the woman who allegedly wiped Jesus’ face with a towel, (a theme which has inspired transcendentally great religious art) and giving more prominence to Mary the mother of Jesus. Wojtyla’s piety was plebeian, saturated in the preoccupations and attitudes of Polish Catholicism. It had a strong apocalyptic streak… Benedict XVI is also deeply indebed to the traditional piety of his native Bavaria, to the baroque churches, the music and devotional practice of his youth. But his traditionalism is altogether more considered, bookish and conceptual than Wojtyla’s, and we neither expect nor fear from him dramatic liturgical innovation.
Nevertheless, Pope Benedict does believe that what he sees as the hectic activism of much post-conciliar liturgy is destructive of true worship.” (The New Pope and the Liturgy - Eaamon Duffy)

I think there is a LOT here. I often wonder if the frustration we have with each other may be due to the fact that the new Pope seems to be taking liturgical renewal and reform in a more traditional direction. Some of us are therefore deeply loyal to Benedict XVI, and others are loyal, but still retain a more John Paul vision vis a vis the liturgy. Is that why those of us loyal to the Magesterium are arguing so much over the liturgy?

What do you think of Duffy’s words excerpted above?

Actually, I don’t think anything of Duffy’s words, as the insinuation in his statement is that the Polish approach to Catholicism is somehow ‘backwards.’ How ridiculous, and how biased.

**You cannot compare the two popes in any way. John Paul II exercised a totally different charism in his pontificate than that of Benedict XVI. John Paul was the Church’s greatest witness in the 20th century, spreading the knowledge of Christ throughout the world in a way totally unlike any other pontiff has done in the Church’s 2,000 year history, especially to the next generation of Catholic Christians. Not only that, he had alot on his plate as pope - the fall of the Iron Curtain, the democratization of the eastern European countries, protecting the Faith in Poland, confrontation of the evils inherit in a culture of death which was and still is enveloping the world, etc. Churchwise, he straightened out the Catechism and began the process of guiding the Church back to the intent of Vatican II. Benedict’s pontificate is a continuation in many ways of that of John Paul II’s with regard to the latter. **