| International News

This will be a pontificate that emphasizes and vigorously contends for the truth; one that proclaims the ever fresh yet ancient truths of classical Christianity to an emerging new paganism.

CHESAPEAKE, Va. (Catholic Online) - In April of 2005, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger was selected by the Holy Spirit, working through the Church, to assume the Chair of Peter as Pope Benedict XVI. Shortly after this momentous event, I wrote a lengthier article on the possible implications of his election. I now offer portions of that reflection for our readers’ consideration. I began the original article with a quotation from Alisdair MacIntyre, taken from his book “After Virtue”. I now believe the connection is proving to be prophetic:

--------
“It is always dangerous to draw too precise parallels between one historical period and another; and among the most misleading of such parallels are those which have been drawn between our own age in Europe and North America and the Epoch in which the Roman Empire declined into the Dark Ages. Nonetheless, certain parallels there are. A crucial turning point in that earlier history occurred when men and women of good will turned aside from the task of shoring up the Roman Imperium and ceased to identify the continuation of civility and moral community with the maintenance of the Imperium.

What they set themselves to achieve instead- often not recognizing fully what they were doing- was the construction of new forms of community within which the moral life could be sustained so that both morality and civility might survive the coming ages of barbarism and darkness. If my account of our moral condition is correct, we ought also to conclude that for some time now we too have reached that turning point. 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 already 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.”

On April 16, 2005, two Latin words were proclaimed from the balcony overlooking St Peters Square in Rome. The square was filled to overflowing with pilgrims. The entire experience was extended, through television, radio and the internet, to include the entire waiting world. “Habemus Papam” (“We Have a Pope!”), the Cardinal announced, and that world seemed to stand still. Pope Benedict XVI stepped forward onto the balcony overlooking St. Peters Square, and into the waiting world, referring to himself as “…a simple, humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord.”

I was overcome with joy, gratitude and profound hope for the future when I heard this news. I was visiting with a priest friend in Richmond, Virginia. We had been immersed in an intense conversation when another friend, a Bishop of an ecclesial community not in full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, called me on my cell phone. “Have you heard?” he asked, “Habemus Papam, We have a Pope!” he proclaimed, hardly able to contain his own joy. (A few years later, this wonderful man would lay aside even his Episcopal ministry to enter the full communion of the Catholic Church).

It was during that profound passing of Pope John Paul II, that then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger spoke these words “ None of us can ever forget how in that last Easter Sunday of his life, the Holy Father, marked by suffering, came once more to the window of the Apostolic Palace and one last time gave his blessing “urbi et orbi” (to the City and the world) We can be sure that our beloved pope is standing today at the window of the Father’s house, that he sees us and blesses us.” One of the fruits of that blessing was the selection of his friend, confidante, trusted theologian and beloved brother, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger to occupy the Chair of Peter.

We live in what Pope John Paul rightly labeled a culture of death. The eerily prophetic words of the moral philosopher, Alasdair MacIntyre (recorded in his seminal work “After Virtue” which was first published in 1981, and rightly exposed the failures of the post modern age), are worthy of reflection. Could it be that another Benedict is here? Only time and prayer will tell. However, I believe it is entirely possible. In his homily prior to the convening of the papal conclave where he was be chosen to fill the Chair of Peter, then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger gave us a prophetic insight into the challenges of the age:

“How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking... The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves - thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to ...