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Thread ID: 15757 | Posts: 10 | Started: 2004-11-24
2004-11-24 14:10 | User Profile
Is he on the side of the angels? (Filed: 14/11/2004)
Damian Thompson reviews The Pope in Winter by John Cornwell
These days there is an easy way of pigeonholing Catholic commentators: ask them about Pope John Paul II's mental faculties. Conservatives insist that his intellect remains as sharp as ever. Liberals dwell - sometimes gloatingly - on rumours that Parkinson's Disease has enveloped the pontiff in a fog so dense that he scarcely knows where he is.
No one can claim that it does not matter: the 84-year-old Pope is the spiritual and administrative leader of a community of a billion souls. What is less clear is whether his current state of mind is relevant to his place in history; after all, we do not judge Churchill by his embarrassing last days in office. The back cover of The Pope in Winter focuses on its subject's alleged depression, blank episodes and paranoia. This is the peg on which John Cornwell hangs "the case for the prosecution": the first biography of John Paul II to argue that he has done more harm than good.
The book is a hatchet job, and for that reason many Catholics will dismiss its reports of geriatric confusion. Alas, they ring true. George Carey recently revealed that, as long ago as 1997, the Pope had to be reminded who had written one of his own encyclicals. Last year, he forgot the location of the basilica of St John Lateran. "The memory lapse was equivalent to the Queen asking where Windsor Castle is," says Cornwell - a cheap shot, perhaps, but one that hits its target.
The Pope is not senile, but he wanders in and out of lucidity. He is presumably aware of this, so why does he not retire? His answer is that Jesus did not climb down from his cross. As an explanation, that would work better if the Pope were suffering from a purely physical illness, as opposed to one that corrodes the brain. It also supports one of Cornwell's more credible charges: that John Paul is self-important.
"He is by no means as humble as he appears," admits his friend, the philosopher Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka. There are hints of personal vanity, too: he is the first pope to wear contact lenses.
John Paul has been a guru for half a century. As a priest-academic in 1950s Poland, he won plaudits for his fusion of modern philosophy and medieval dogmatics. John Cornwell is less impressed. "A poorly reconciled mixture of phenomenological ducking and weaving and scholastic goosestepping," he calls it.
Cornwell himself is an odd combination of Cambridge don and sensationalist hack, and that artful line captures the flavour of this biography: it contains a measure of truth but also a journalist's subliminal trick - the word "goosestepping". Later, Cornwell refers to the then Cardinal Wojtyla's innocent friendship with Tymieniecka as a "relationship", emphasises how sexy she is, and labels her husband "complaisant". None of which will surprise Cornwell-watchers: this is a man who, while exonerating Pius XII of Nazi sympathies, nevertheless entitled his book about him Hitler's Pope.
Karol Wojtyla's intellect was forged by tyranny. He spent the war as a forced labourer in a quarry, risking his life by studying for ordination: the Nazis killed 2,500 Polish priests. Cornwell says this explains the Pope's contempt for priests who leave the ministry. That makes sense, as does his suggestion that the success of the millennium of Polish Christianity in 1966 led John Paul to overestimate the significance of the year 2000.
These early pages of The Pope in Winter are sympathetic, but even here there is a suspicion of facts being manipulated. According to Cornwell, John Paul once told a crowd that, when he was a teenager, the Virgin Mary granted him "special interviews", a claim that, if true, might explain his supposed egomania. But I can find no other trace of the story, and John Paul's most authoritative biographer, George Weigel, insists that it is rubbish: what the Pope told the crowd was that he and his fellow students had been granted "audiences" by Mary - ie, that she listened to their prayers. That is not the same thing at all.
Cornwell's record of John Paul II's pontificate is often grotesquely biased. Again and again, traditional Catholic doctrine is presented as some frightful reactionary innovation by this Pope and blamed for problems that would have arisen anyway, such as the decline in Mass attendance. Cornwell even tries to take the shine off John Paul's victory over Communism with a dig at his ally Ronald Reagan. We are told that, in the office of Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador, there were files on dead children whose murderers were "trained by Reagan's compatriots". How typically snide: Romero was killed before Reagan's election.
So unfair is Cornwell to his subject that, paradoxically, he distracts attention from the Pope's genuine failures. The Church's cover-up of clerical paedophilia was scandalous, and John Paul must bear some responsibility for it. But the actual abuse reached its peak decades ago, during the pontificate of Paul VI. Cornwell blurs the distinction between the cover-up and the original crimes and, true to form, pins much of the blame for the abuse on John Paul's high doctrine of the priest hood and centralising policies. (Throughout the book, he ludicrously overstates the extent of Vatican central isation. If the Pope insists on appointing every bishop in his own mould, why are there so many apologetic liberals among the English hierarchy?)
Far from exposing "the dark face of John Paul II's papacy", The Pope in Winter reveals the degree to which Cornwell's prejudices interfere with his judgment. This is a pity, because A Thief in the Night, his demolition of the conspiracy theories surrounding the death of John Paul I, was a model of impartiality. Something has gone wrong in the 15 years since it was published: Cornwell's liberalism has hardened into groin-kicking intolerance.
As a result, this new book is indeed a record of intellectual decline, but not quite in the way that its author intended.
Damian Thompson is editor-in-chief of the Catholic Herald. Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of Telegraph Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without licence. For the full copyright statement see Copyright
2004-11-24 14:26 | User Profile
[QUOTE]The Pope is not senile, but he wanders in and out of lucidity. He is presumably aware of this, so why does he not retire? His answer is that Jesus did not climb down from his cross. As an explanation, that would work better if the Pope were suffering from a purely physical illness, as opposed to one that corrodes the brain. It also supports one of Cornwell's more credible charges: that John Paul is self-important.[/QUOTE]
I don't think that's it. My guess is that JPII believes that the Lord has called him to be a living witness to the dignity of the elderly. Remember that this is the man who fought the "culture of death" all his life, and euthanasia for the old and infirm is very much on Hell's agenda these days. The analogy to Christ not climbing down from the cross is thus appropriate.
2004-11-25 00:00 | User Profile
Walter Yannis,
I agree Popes do not retire; they die. The idea of having the pope retire is most sickening.
But He has done great damage to the church by making Priests, Bishops, and Cadinals retire. I think it was Pope John Paul II that started this nonsense, so he may be the reason why people have called on him to retire. I mean not letting the older Cadinals vote for the new pope is just plane stupid. The Church made it for 2000 years without making Priests, Bishops, and Cadinals retire! Why start now?
The so-called "Conservatives" in the Church seem no better the the Modernists a good part of the time.
2004-11-25 02:49 | User Profile
Pope John Paul II is the Vicar of Christ. His actions are not to be questioned. He has done more for righteousness than any Pope in many generations. Humility and reverence are the beginning of any attempt to try and understand his deep personal connection to God Almighty.
2004-11-25 08:12 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Exelsis_Deo]Pope John Paul II is the Vicar of Christ. His actions are not to be questioned. He has done more for righteousness than any Pope in many generations. Humility and reverence are the beginning of any attempt to try and understand his deep personal connection to God Almighty.[/QUOTE]
Well, I share your sentiment, but the fact remains that we had some really bad Popes, including the Medici Popes who largely caused the Reformation.
2004-11-25 08:13 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Faust]Walter Yannis,
I agree Popes do not retire; they die. The idea of having the pope retire is most sickening.
But He has done great damage to the church by making Priests, Bishops, and Cadinals retire. I think it was Pope John Paul II that started this nonsense, so he may be the reason why people have called on him to retire. I mean not letting the older Cadinals vote for the new pope is just plane stupid. The Church made it for 2000 years without making Priests, Bishops, and Cadinals retire! Why start now?
The so-called "Conservatives" in the Church seem no better the the Modernists a good part of the time.[/QUOTE]
I never looked into that question, and I will defer to your greater learning. Could you post a link on that? It was a change in Code of Canon Law I take it? Which would make sense, sinice one of JPII's great accomplishments was a re-write of the entire Code (which also didn't escape criticism, but I'm not in a position to offer an opinion).
Walter
2004-11-26 05:29 | User Profile
Walter Yannis,
I do not know a lot about this subject. I do not know if it is in Code of Canon Law or not. You mean he rewrote all of Canon Law, why the hell did he do a think like that?
I think the forced retirement age is Priests is 70 and 75 for Bishops. Cardinals over the age of 80 may not vote. This just makes no sense to me.
I did find this bit about the cardinals, I could not find a good link about the retirement age for Priests and Bishops. It was Paul VI that did the change in the cardinals.
[QUOTE]In 1970, Paul VI ousted cardinals over the age of eighty from the electorate and increased the limit on the number of cardinal electors to 120. Even this limitation has been disregarded by John Paul II. As of August 2004, 123 out of the 190 cardinals are qualified to vote.
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_election[/url] [/QUOTE]
2004-11-26 07:28 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Faust]Walter Yannis,
I do not know a lot about this subject. I do not know if it is in Code of Canon Law or not. You mean he rewrote all of Canon Law, why the hell did he do a think like that?
I think the forced retirement age is Priests is 70 and 75 for Bishops. Cardinals over the age of 80 may not vote. This just makes no sense to me.
I did find this bit about the cardinals, I could not find a good link about the retirement age for Priests and Bishops. It was Paul VI that did the change in the cardinals.[/QUOTE]
[url]http://www.americapress.org/articles/ProvostSafe.htm[/url]
2005-02-01 18:27 | User Profile
[B]Hello,[/B]
[B]Regarding thier Pontiff hes no doubt regarded as the papa of all Christendom, hence the name pope. The Catholic Church is the great momma of Christendom, one realises that without them the rest can not be. Your very exitense is based on Catholics. To wich any whim are service many run to.[/B] [B]The Catholics realise this, and so do you, wich is why you feel unity is needed. And you recognise thier Pontiff as supreme spiritual authority.[/B] [B]With regards to those that do support for Catholics then perhaps you could takke heed the timeless calls to obstain from Catholics as called for be the Protestant Reformers... I relic of what once was.[/B]
[B]Peace![/B] [B]Wesley Mcgranor[/B] [B]Founder [url]http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Anti-Catholic[/url][/B]
2005-02-01 20:01 | User Profile
[QUOTE=WesleyWes][B]Hello,[/B] [B]Regarding thier Pontiff hes no doubt regarded as the papa of all Christendom, hence the name pope. The Catholic Church is the great momma of Christendom, one realises that without them the rest can not be. Your very exitense is based on Catholics. To wich any whim are service many run to.[/B] [B]The Catholics realise this, and so do you, wich is why you feel unity is needed. And you recognise thier Pontiff as supreme spiritual authority.[/B]][/QUOTE]
Well stated, Wes, even if you are a heathen. A few points:
Popes can step down, though it rarely happens.
There is no recorded instance of papal senility, and memory lapses are a different matter. Heck, my memory is declining and I'm 40 years younger.
The Vicar of Christ can be questioned, particularly when his views contradict his predecessors, as does for instance the Pope's defense of (or ambiguity about) religious liberty.
I think the Pope is ego driven, perhaps stemming from his days of theatrical ambitions.
Despite all this, I fear his successor will be even worse. We have not had a solid Pope for almost 50 years now--and it shows.