*** DEBUG START ***
*** DEBUG END ***

A thoroughly modern conservative

15 February 2013

Benedict XVI's resignation goes against his usual approach, says Paul Vallely

ONE wag on Twitter suggested that Prince Charles would have tuned in avidly to the rolling news coverage of the shock resignation of Pope Benedict XVI - and would have phoned the Queen to ask: "Have you got the telly on, Mother?"

But is the papacy a monarchical vocation? And, if it is, ought it to be? Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, in the contrasting manners of their departure, have offered illuminating answers.

Benedict's resignation, the first for almost 600 years, highlights how, for centuries, the Church has been wary of papal resignations. A living ex-pope can present his successor with a big problem. The old pope stands, however silently, as a potential rallying point for nostalgic discontent; the new pope may spend much of his time looking over his shoulder. The modern media age adds another problem. At the first sign of papal ill-health, an avalanche of speculation will begin, which could be unnecessarily unsettling.

None of this explains why Pope John Paul II struggled on in office for years, despite a courageous fight with Parkinson's disease, which meant that eventually he was unable to walk or speak normally. His public bearing of his evident suffering was central to his theology. The man who had been a fine athlete before becoming pope had preached much to the world about the intrinsic dignity of the human person. Each individual, being made in the image of God, is to be respected simply for their being. In a world where people are valued for what they do or own, this was a radical reminder. It was at the core of his insistence on the protection of the vulnerable - the poor, the sick, the disabled, the unborn, and those close to death. All have the same intrinsic value and personal dignity as any one else. To be, not to do, is enough to define a person.

Preach the gospel always, St Francis of Assisi is supposed to have said, and, if necessary, use words. John Paul's drawn-out dying was part of his witness to the world. There was nothing romantic about it. Suffering is an evil and a trial in itself, he wrote in Evangelium Vitae, but it can always become a source of good. Not to comprehend this is to disregard God and overestimate human autonomy - one of the besetting arrogances of our age. "Gradually, as the individual takes up his cross," he wrote elsewhere, "spiritually uniting himself to the cross of Christ, the salvific meaning of suffering is revealed."

But, in doing that, the burden of Pope John Paul II's duties as pontiff fell on others, much of it on the man who would be his successor. That may well have been a factor in bringing Benedict to his decision to resign. A man whose life has been utterly disciplined, internally and externally, may also have been unable to reconcile himself to staying in office physically and symbolically, but abdicating control of the Church.

"I am well aware that this ministry, owing to its essential spiritual nature, must be carried out not only with words and deeds, but no less with prayer and suffering," he told his fellow cardinals, before adding the key judgement: "However, in today's world, subject to so many rapid changes and shaken by questions of deep relevance for the life of faith . . . both strength of mind and body are necessary."

Such logic is, as one Italian commentator has put it, "an eruption of modernity inside the Church". If so, there is a deep irony that so conservative a pontiff - who restored the Latin mass, set up an Ordinariate for Anglicans, quashed collegiality and promoted reactionaries as bishops, and slapped down US nuns, as he had liberation theologians - should have departed by doing something so thoroughly modern.

Paul Vallely is associate editor of The Independent.

Browse Church and Charity jobs on the Church Times jobsite

Letters to the editor

Letters for publication should be sent to letters@churchtimes.co.uk.

Letters should be exclusive to the Church Times, and include a full postal address. Your name and address will appear below your letter unless requested otherwise.

Forthcoming Events

Women Mystics: Female Theologians through Christian History

13 January - 19 May 2025

An online evening lecture series, run jointly by Sarum College and The Church Times

tickets available

 

Festival of Faith and Literature

28 February - 2 March 2025

tickets available

 

Visit our Events page for upcoming and past events 

The Church Times Archive

Read reports from issues stretching back to 1863, search for your parish or see if any of the clergy you know get a mention.

FREE for Church Times subscribers.

Explore the archive

Welcome to the Church Times

 

To explore the Church Times website fully, please sign in or subscribe.

Non-subscribers can read four articles for free each month. (You will need to register.)