Know Your Enemy
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The Death of Pope Benedict XVI (w/ Michael O'Loughlin)
🕑 Added 2023-01-08 17:41:49 +0000 UTCOn Dec. 31, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI died at the age of 95. A towering figure in the Catholic Church in the second half of the twentieth century and beyond—especially his decades helming the Vatican's powerful Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, then as Pope and Pope Emeritus—Benedict was involved in nearly all of the Church's many crises and controversies. He cracked down on liberation theologians, held a reactionary line on homosexuality at the height of the AIDS crisis, and slowly awakened to the depths and depravity of the Catholic sex-abuse scandal—but he also wrote movingly about God's love and took positions on the environment and the economy that would be mostly ignored by his conservative fans.
To try to make sense of Benedict's life and work, especially his relationship with American Catholics, Matt is joined by Michael O'Loughlin, the national correspondent at America magazine and author of Hidden Mercy: AIDS, Catholics, and the Untold Stories of Compassion in the Face of Fear.
Sources:
Michael O'Loughlin, Hidden Mercy: AIDS, Catholics, and the Untold Stories of Compassion in the Face of Fear (2021)
Paul Elie, "Benedict XVI’s Most Powerful Influence on the Catholic Church Came Before He Was Pope," New Yorker, Jan 4, 2023
Frederic Martel, In the Closet of the Vatican: Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy (2020)
Comments
Andrew Steimer
I would love to learn more about how the Catholic church transitioned from an element of colonization/imperialism to promoting liberation theology. That's quite the heel-face turn.
KorbiFüller
anyone know where to watch the mass in St Peter’s for gaenswein they mention at the end of the ep?
Adam Cassidy
they address this pretty directly, my guy if you want a polemic maybe go write your own
Leonard Haise
Really disappointed that neither of you addressed the fact that while Benedict may have “dealt with” the sex abuse crisis, one of his primary strategies was to bring the investigations in house, routinely refused to cooperate with local police, and harbored Cardinal Law from prosecution in the Vatican. Come on, guys. Really hard to take this seriously with a hand-wavy “he had his flaws.” I grew up Catholic in the height of the sex abuse crisis. I personally know people who had their entire lives ruined. You really do the church’s victims a great disservice by not acknowledging the direct role that then-Cardinal Ratzinger played in providing cover for abusive priests and the hierarchy that enabled them. I mean, who cares if a small group of progressive Catholics tried to thread the needle and partner with activist groups to distribute condoms during the AIDS crisis if the church as an institution continued with a formal policy of "Yeah, AIDS is bad, but condoms are much worse" well into the 2000s? A truly evil policy that caused thousands of deaths. The philosophical underpinnings of Benedict are moot when you look at the reality of the destruction for which he (and others) were very much responsible.
E
That would be great. Would also any appreciate reading recommendations on Latin America/liberation theology Matt has.
Thomas Arnold
Have you all done much with Michael Novak? The excommunication of Leonardo Boff is a landmark Rottweiler bite, but Novak might serve as a backdrop of Enemy 80’s political theology.
Tim Olson
Great episode, love how fair you are to Benedict even among his flaws. I was wondering as well if an episode could be done (maybe patreon only) that talks about both John Paul II (and his visits to the usa) and the conglomeration of the religious right in America with the institutional catholic church in the midst of the party switch, and what conflicts that creates for religious people who have an open mind perhaps but get pulled into conservatism. I don't know exactly how this would go, but in a similar vein I would l ok be to hear the Jewish side of the story, and the differences between American and Israeli Jews (maybe just a whole Israeli politics video, considering how much of it is due to american conservatives).
mjs
Yeah, honestly, after recording this I thought that that topic would make a good episode; no guarantees, but I’m thinking about it (Matt)
Axel Herrera
Thanks for this analysis of Benedict XVI’s legacy. Some of it I knew (particularly in regard to homosexuality) some of it I didn’t. In a future episode I’d be interested to hear more discussion of liberation theology and the political and religious opposition to it. I was raised Catholic and am of Latin American descent, but it’s not something I know much about.
