Much about Benedict XVI and his Pontificate is unprecedented. Still, it appears a minor phenomenon that books are being written now about the media storm that descended against the Church and particularly, Benedict XVI, since January 2010 (when news of decades-old sex abuses of children by priests in a German boarding-school unleashed a flood of similar disclosures in a few other countries).
Tied in with the 2009 Irish government reports on similar abuses in Ireland, it led to ingenious and destructive 'enterprise reporting' by agencies like Germany's Der Spiegel and Sueddeutsche Zeitung, and AP and the New York Times, seeking to find any sex-abuse-related cases they could directly link to Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI.
We are all too familiar with what has happened since - not the least the Pope's shining example of how to deal with body blows to him and the 360-degree assault on the Church he leads, by simply saying and doing what is right and what is true.
In the United States, Gregory Erlandson and Matthew Bunson of Our Sunday Visitor were first off the starting block with their Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis last May. Now, three books on the same subject are coming out in Italy.
Three new Italian books
look into the roots of
attacks against Benedict XVI
Translated from
August 18, 2010
ROME - Perhaps it is more than a coincidence that in the next few days, three books are coming out that deal with the same subject: Benedict XVI under siege.
The formidable election of Prof. Ratzinger to Peter's Chair five years ago was not really a surprise (he had been Papa Wojtyla's right hand man for more than two decades), but certainly surprising are the first five years of his Pontificate which have been full of unexpected events and initiatives. Not to mention increasing - and increasingly poisoned - controversies, as if this gentle but firm man provokes the killer instinct in the media sharks who, from the day he became Pope, have homed in on what they consider his 'strangeness'.
[i.e., he is not John Paul II!]
The Regensburg lecture and the lecture he ended up not giving at Rome's La Sapienza University, some episcopal nominations, the Motu Proprio formally restoring full rights to the traditional Mass, his initiatives towards Lefebvrians and Anglicans, his statement about condoms and AIDS, and finally, the perfect storm: pedophile priests. It is the chronicle of a siege that promises to continue. The sharks have been trying to tear him to pieces.
Attacco a Ratzinger (published by Piemme), written by Vatican correspondents Andrea Tornielli of
Il Giornale, and our own Paolo Rodari, reviews the accusations and the scandals, the prophesies and plots that have been unleashed in the past five years against Benedict XVI.
Every imputation made is weighed with scrupulous rigor and accuracy, using first-hand testimonies and documents. In the end, the authors ask: Is there a precise 'rule' behind these attacks, or does it have more to do with the lack of a communications strategy on the part of the Vatican?
[But the two are not mutually exclusive!] Do these attacks only originate from outside the Church, or to they also originate from some church circles?
[Again, both apply!]
Aldo Valli
[currently Vatican correspondent for Italian state TV RAI's premier TV newscast TG-1, and former flak for Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini when he was Archbishop of Milan] has written
Attacco alla Chiesa: Perche colpiscono il Papa [Attack on the Church: Why they are striking at the Pope)(published by Lindau).
He seeks to explain
why Papa Ratzinger is so 'indigestible' to public opinion [I beg to disagree: not to public opinion per se, but to the MSM who shape that public opinion].
Perhaps, he writes, because he insists on speaking the truth in a world that is skeptical and resigned to skepticism; or perhaps because he is fighting for justice
[to be rendered to both victims and offenders in the sex abuse cases] but also to eliminate the 'filth' in the Church.
Valli adds that certainly, Benedict XVI's encyclicals are not a quick read and require patient reflection. Nor can one say that their author is telegenic.
[What do this have to do really with why he is being attacked? Except, of course, as a commentary on the character of MSM journalists who 1) have no patience to read anything substantial that requires reflection and 2) who are so superficial as to use the quality of being 'telegenic' as a criterion for substance! But then one must be skeptical of Valli who has never gotten over his fixation on John Paul II and has always been ready to throw Benedict XVI under the bus! So I am happily surprised if he argues what the Foglio reporter says he does in the preceding paragraph.]
Alessandro Gnocchi and Mario Palmaro have written the pamphlet
Viva il Papa! Perche lo attaccano, perche difenderlo (Long live the Pope! Why they attack him and why me must defend him) (published by Valecchi) in which they explain that the bitter reactions to Benedict XVI by his detractors also have to do with what he has done to strengthen the institution of the papacy itself.
These and similar publications by Catholic writers of varying sensibilities all reflect the rediscovery of a noble literary genre, apologetics, applied to the Pope. With the common thought that "to defend Peter is to defend Catholicism itself".
P.S.
Interestingly, Aldo Maria Valli has reacted to the 'summary' given by the Il Foglio article above of what he says in his book, and to some unfavorable comments by Lella's followers, in a letter to Lella that she has published on her blog. I have translated the relevant part below:
Aldo Valli replies
Translated from
August 19, 2010
...The preview by Il Foglio was somewhat misleading. In the book, I do not say that Benedict XVI is indigestible to public opinion. What I wrote is that he irritates a lot of people because he speaks about justice, and because, by his actions, he gives credibility to the Church - that Church which many would love to see reduced to, at best, a charitable social agency, without a right to participate in the public discourse.
Moreover, in the book, I do not concern myself at all with the question (to me irrelevant) of whether Benedict XVI is telegenic or not. I sought instead to show the richness of his teaching and to clear up existing prejudices against him.
About John Paul II, it is true that I feel great affection for him, but I like the present Pope just as much, and I follow his Magisterium with great intellectual passion.
I will be happy if you will read the book (which will be out in a month) and then start a discussion about it. Thank you for your attention.
It was very welcome, wise and professional of Valli to clear up the points he did, and I stand corrected for my own reactions to how the Foglio article presented some of his statements.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/08/2010 22:01]