Virility as Gentleness and Strength
The heart of virility is gentleness in strength and strength in gentleness, both in humility and chastity.
Every man is destined for gentleness-in-strength-in-humility-in-chastity-in-Fatherhood: the giving of, the provision for, the protection of, and the reverent tendering of life.
We might contrast two types of boy by physicality and temperament: the tough and the tender. The tough is muscular, energetic, athletic, aggressive, confident, combative, boisterous, and fearless. The tender is sensitive, gentle, quiet, reserved, thoughtful, artistic, receptive, insecure and anxious. These are clearly abstract, ideal "types" not a binary reality like male/female. Each male exemplifies both types in multiple and complex ways, as on a spectrum. However the form and final purpose of virility for every man is the capacity to give and cherish life in fatherhood, in gentleness-and-strength. So the tough guy has to become gentle and kind; the tender guy has to become strong and fierce. At the end, the strength of the tender is morally superior to that of the tough because he has overcome his congenital weakness. The tenderness of the tough is morally superior to the gentle because he has overcome his temperamental crudeness. In both cases, the virtue is not natural, but the fruit of moral effort and divine grace.
John Paul epitomized masculinity as strength: athletic, confident, charismatic, magnetic. He strode the earth like Samson, King David or El Cid. This ferocity was leavened by gentleness: poetic, philosophical, sensitive, tender and kind. Joseph Ratzinger was a contrast: by constitution retiring, quiet, shy, sensitive, thoughtful, sedate. But beneath that calm exterior: an intellect and will of iron. Both were masterpieces of iconic virility flowering out of native talent, human freedom and divine grace.
Strength-in-Gentleness
Joseph Ratzinger, when alive, may have been the meekest man on earth, like Moses in his day. If you have read a single page of his writing, or watched him on camera, or heard him speak then you know what I mean. He simply exudes gentleness. But he was known as "the Rottweiler" and "Ratzi the Nazi." Mocked and despised by his critics, he never answered in kind. He never said an unkind or emotional word about anyone. In speech and deportment, he was unfailing sober, charitable and professional. He did not dwell upon his own feelings, but upon the task at hand, his mission. Here again he was quintessentially masculine. But we ask: why was he hated so?
Paradigmatic Father: Clear, Strong, Authoritative, Traditional, Demanding
In life and teaching, he was crystal clear, firm and unbending, steady, demanding, and drawing always authoritatively from the Church and God's own Revelation. He stood firmly upon Tradition even as he expressed the abiding Truth in fresh, restorative ways. As the quintessential father figure he was a lightening rod for the Catholic Progressivism so eager to embrace the sexual liberation of the Cultural Revolution of the 60s. That momentous historical happening combined two interrelated energies: the lustful demand for sex free from fatherhood/motherhood and the rejection of fatherhood as authority (from God), tradition, sacrifice, and accountability to the moral order. Catholic progressivism, like the broader Cultural Liberalism it apes, is fundamentally oedipal rage at the frustrating father and infantile demand for unhindered erotic pleasure. As such, Ratzinger is everything they hate: chaste, demanding, unbending, clear, humble, sober, objective, traditional, manly. All the demons behind the Sexual Revolution find in this gentle, quiet, studious man their Antagonist, Nemesis and Foil. No wonder they aroused such hatred and contempt for him. He received it in quiet serenity and fortitude.
The Priest Sex Scandal: Blaming John Paul and Benedict
The very critics who fault his sexual ethos as overly rigorous like to blame him and his predecessor/partner for failing to rapidly, firmly address the priest sex scandal. This merits consideration. Retrospectively we all wish more was done sooner by the hierarchy. But this blame game is too easy for those removed to play so moralistically. The apparent omission of firm, early action should be understood in the context of three realities.
First, John Paul and Benedict are both naturally and supernaturally innocent in sexuality. The virtue of chastity is in every breath they breathe. They lived among the hellish evils of Nazism and Communism but within Polish and Bavarian Catholic communities centered around wholesome, holy spousal fidelity. The grotesqueries that exploded on the West in the 60s were incomprehensible to them, as they were to the entire Great Generation of our own nation. Our own parents, prevailing against Nazism and Communism, were unprepared for the Culture War. John Paul and Benedict were singularly prepared, intellectually and spiritually, as they together articulated a fresh-yet-ancient ethos of chastity and fidelity. But pervasive perversity within the priesthood took them entirely by surprise, as it did the entire Church. When the facts became fully evident, Cardinal Ratzinger was assigned a key role in addressing it and he did this in his customary conscientious manner. He gets high grades for what he called his "Friday penance" (as he worked on these horrific cases every Friday.)
Secondly, the Catholic Church is mostly run out of parishes and dioceses, not out of central headquarters in Rome. I was surprised to see how small Cardinal Ratzinger's offices in the Vatican are. The town hall of a small American municipality is larger. This office for the Faith has responsibility for Church teaching, but could hardly monitor an investigate every allegation of wrongdoing. In many ways, the Church in operation is decentralized.
Thirdly, Ratzinger was a competent administrator, probably better than John Paul. By nature he was not a bureaucrat; John Paul even less so. Both were priests, prophets, wise men. Above all both were Protagonists of Freedom. For this they fought Nazism, Communism and later Cultural Liberalism. By freedom they understood not negative "freedom from" but "freedom for". It is not opting out but opting in: voluntary engagement in the True, the Good and the Beautiful. Their mission was to proclaim the Gospel of Freedom. This demanding task left little resources for micro-management of dioceses defaulting in their duties.
Greatest Catholic Theologian of the 20th Century
I agree with this widespread assessment, even as I suspect he would happily share this accolade with his two older brothers, friends, collaborators: John Paul and Balthasar. The work of the three reinforce and complement each other and together compose a three-part Catholic synthesis unequaled in our history as it preserves and enriches the singular accomplishments of Augustine and Thomas. Ratzinger was less innovative than John Paul in his catechesis of the human body and Balthasar with his magisterial dramatics and aesthetics. He was more simple. More conservative, as he drank deeply and directly from he sources, the fathers and doctors. His academic life built upon dissertations on Augustine and Bonaventure. With everyone else he imbibed the Thomistic synthesis but enriched it by depth study of the other fathers/doctors and broad study of modern culture. He was the most traditional in that sense, yet current in scholarship. Everything he said and wrote had about it a freshness, vigor and vitality...always something old but in a new dimension. His particular genius, in which he surpassed his two elder colleagues, was the crystal clarity of his thought. His thinking was easily available to any intelligent adult, even as it expressed the deepest insights and drew from a wealth of erudition, ancient and contemporary. In this he was the unequalled, master catechist of his time. A German predecessor and mentor, Romano Guardini, displayed a similar charism. Every word they write is so simple, so clear, and so luminous with Truth as Beauty. His catechetical legacy will stand with the speculative genius of Balthasar and the philosophical brilliance of John Paul as an everlasting heritage of the Church.
Agonistic Combatant with Modernity in the Culture War
Having prevailed against German Nazism and Russian Communism, Ratzinger was, with John Paul, the primary Culture War combatant against modernity understood as a society-without-God. His brilliant intellect pierced to the heart of a secular society, despairing and suicidal in its destruction of the fathers, surrender to Dionysian indulgence, and detachment from our heavenly Father. This was his particular genius. As noted he was immensely steeped in the fathers, but broadly fluent in historical and current cultural studies. He understood, not only Scripture and Tradition, but the contemporary intellectual world better than anyone else (except Balthasar of course.) He understood the modern world so well, that he also appreciated what is best in it and loved that. With unparalleled nuance, subtlety, and sophistication he distinguished all that is worthy and beautiful in modernity and cherished it. And so, during the Vatican Council he was the singular most young, brilliant and reform-minded theologian. Within a few years, he was the great antagonist of the Cultural Revolution. He had not changed his view: the Church and world around him had been revolutionized. He (with a small elect) was the steady, stable point of a now uprooted and dizzy universe.
Priestly and Clerical
Ratzinger was the most priestly and clerical of men. "Clerical" has become a term of disparagement, especially under Francis. But Catholicism is inherently clerical: our faith is in the sacramental and evangelical ministry of our Clergy. If clerical is bad, Catholic is bad. And of course, many believe that. Our reverence for the clergy flows from our love of the sacraments and the Word entrusted to the hierarchy of the Church. We kiss the hands of our newly-ordained: not because they are a special caste, but because they have given their lives away, for us, in celibacy and obedience, to feed us with sacrament and Word. Ratzinger is the epitome of the clergy at its best: in style, thought, demeanor. He is humble before the Mystery entrusted into his hands and mouth. He is innocent and chaste. He is kind, pastoral, paternal, kind, patient. He is a scholar of the past and future; he is wise; he is insightful and inspiring. Balthasar wrote about the "clerical style;" perhaps he was thinking of his younger friend and protege Joseph Ratzinger. It is a happy reality that an entire generation of young priests are imitative of this exemplary priest.
Did He Abandon Us by Retiring?
In today's Crisis, editor Eric Simmons speaks of his exuberant love for Ratzinger and his theology and his disappointment and grief at what he describes as Pope Benedict's abandonment of us. As we moved deeper into the volatility, instability, polarization and confusion of the Francis era, the feeling of abandonment became overwhelming. We no longer had a steadfast, protective Father. We lacked a steady point of light, stability, guidance, encouragement. We were orphaned. I share and affirm the feeling of abandonment. But not the judgement against the Pope.
Robert Royal in today's Catholic Thing recalls that the Swiss Guard told him that Benedict was blatantly, extremely exhausted. That was clearly the case. There is no cause to suspect his own account: he had become weak, exhausted and not competent for the task. His admission was simply, like his entire life and thought, an affirmation of truth. He was too tired to perform well. It was an action of humility.
His departure surely contrasts with the ending of his predecessor. They are not contradictory. Perhaps they point to the temperamental endowment of each: the one inherently tough and resilient; the other sensitive and fragile. Neither is superior. We need the humble, truthful witness of both. There are times when we must soldier on, to the end, enduring what comes. There are times when we must admit our limitations and hand the reins to another. We must know when to hold them and when to fold them. There is no magic formula. Each must take measure of ourselves and look to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. I have no doubt that both of these saintly geniuses were docile the promptings of the Holy Spirit.
His Last Silent Years
Benedict bears no responsibility for the Francis pontificate. His last, silent years are noteworthy. He remained...patient, hopeful, confident, serene, prayerful...as his successor systematically deconstructed his legacy. He never complained, criticized, or played victim. His silence resounded that of Christ before Pilate and Herod. I attribute it first of all to his confidence that God and the Holy Spirit continue to look over the Church. I attribute it secondly to his noble, patient, serene, sober, virile character. I attribute it lastly to a confidence that whatever was of value in his work, his thought, and his mission would be preserved by the Holy Spirit, in the Church. That confidence is well-placed.
The Blessings of Benedict
- His profound, passionate love for the person of Jesus and this event of our salvation.
- His deep love for the Church, her legacy, her destiny. His humble, sacrificial service of her.
- His brilliant intellect including his grasp of the depth and breath of both reason and faith, their inherent harmony and mutual fruitfulness.
- His profound grasp of Modernity, in it richness as well as it pathology. His depth understanding of history, tradition, and Revelation...in all their richness and fragility.
- His love for the liturgy of the Church as the lifeblood of the Church including his restoration of the Latin Mass, welcoming of the Anglican community, and balanced appraisal of Vatican II and its implementation
- His prayerful, holy, pure life of priestly witness.
- His virility, silence, serenity, patience, sobriety, prudence, wisdom, and fidelity to his mission.
This is the most happy of deaths. His long, fruitful, faithful life was a beacon of light, clarity, certainty, stability and encouragement. He lived and taught the Truth in Love. We rejoice and bask in the light he reflected to us.
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