An Evangelical Looks at Pope Benedict XVI
Russell D. Moore, Moore to the Point
With Pope Benedict XVI’s shocking resignation this morning, evangelical Christians might be tempted to see this the way a college football fan might view the departure of his rival team’s head coach. But the global stakes are much, much higher.
Benedict: Last of the Heroic Generation
R.R. Reno, First Things
With the announcement of his resignation, Pope Benedict signals the end of the heroic generation.
Orthodox-Catholic relations won’t be affected by change of Vatican leader – Russian Church
Interfax
The Moscow Patriarchate hopes relations between the Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches will be developing as previously when a new pope is elected.
Papal Resignations — A Historian’s Take
Kevin White, Mere Orthodoxy
As a historian, and one whose work covers part of the Middle Ages, Pope Benedict’s resignation was equal parts surprising and fascinating.
His remarks indicate he made his decision due in part to the nature of today’s world. Christians everywhere have lamented the decline of the faith, the decline in the number of people who are daily trying to walk in the Way, or at least crawl in the Way (perhaps a better description of me). If you are one of those lamenting and you have wondered if perhaps it is just your perception that is askew, know that yesterday a pope believed the world is being shaken so severely that it justified an action no pope has taken in almost 600 years. Your perception, it seems, is not askew.
The future of Christianity in this world is uncertain, as uncertain as it has been for many, many centuries. How uncertain is the future of Christianity? So uncertain that for the first time in the centuries following the Reformation, Protestants and Catholics seem to be looking anywhere and everywhere – including to each other – for anyone holding to an orthodox view of the faith, of the history, of the mercy, and of the ethical framework standing opposed to what Benedict calls ‘the dictatorship of relativism.’ For those of us still meandering around down here, this moment in history reveals what is our personal test: do we become weak-kneed and yellow-bellied and go the way of the world, or do we continue clawing and scratching our way up the hill, knowing with Abraham that the Lord will provide? We shall esteem those who have lived a full life and now suffer towards the end, but here we are, it is our time to put on the full armor of God, to find the best five stones for slaying Goliath, or to merely stand back and watch as the enemies of God mock everything holy day after day. It does seem then, slaying Goliath is a young man’s game. In that, Pope Benedict XVI may have a point.
Individual soldiers come and go, but the battle belongs to the Lord. I sometimes think we are at present penned up in Helm’s Deep surrounded by Uruk-Hai in the darkest of nights. But then I remember that our release will come with the dawn. And the sun will rise, because the Son has Risen.
Can someone please explain why the Catholic Church feels that its beliefs about marriage need to be backed up with the force of law (even when it involves those who do not subscribe to the Catholic faith) while it has, for decades, been unwilling to allow its clerics to be held accountable to that same civil law when it comes to one of the most heinous of crimes (the exploitation and abuse of minors)?
“Joseph Ratzinger, when he was Archbishop of Munich, personally signed off on sending a priest to therapy, after that priest had raped several children, never notified the police, never told the parents of the children at the parish the priest was then assigned to, and because of this negligence, was, in my view, complicit in the rape of several more children before the priest was finally caught, arrested and sent to jail. Let me repeat that: the current Pope enabled and abetted the rape of children – and his only way out was to blame a lower official, who subsequently said he’d been pressured. More than that, no one else in the church knows more about this long record of child-rape than Ratzinger. From 2001 onwards, all cases of child rape or abuse were ordered to be sent to his personal office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.”
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2010/03/16/how-is-the-pope-different-from-cardinal-law/
The Church’s claims are extraordinary: they claim to be the “One True Church”, that its papal figureheads are the successors of Peter and can speak “infallibly” on doctrine and morals.
The dangers of such hubris should now be obvious to anyone.
James,
I will give answer to only the first line of your post. Since I am not a Roman Catholic, I will allow others more knowledgable to answer the rest of your post.
It would seem to me that the reason the Roman Catholic Church, and indeed many Protestants want heterosexual marriage supported by law, and not other sexual derivations, is again the fact that Christian love compels Christians to practice good citizenship. good citizenship does not include giving liberty to every vent of the human will. To do so brings the Wrath of God upon the individual’s involved in sinful lives, and also brings God’s Wrath upon the nation that supports ungodliness, whether or not that nation largely knows God or not. So in fact the R.C. church and others desire to work for the blessing of the nation and not it’s curse. You are quite right that the churches have done a poor job the,selves living up to those standards, and have found themselves supporting unholy things including homosexual sex. Pedophilia, etc. either by condoning such things outright, or by turning a blind eye to it. That brings a curse too, and needs deep repentance and confession as well as absolution from the Lord. However, the fact that some churches have failed to live up to the standards of the Lord does not mean they should give up on the standards nor seek those standards for the blessings of the land.
Robert, our legal system does not rest on what some believe angers or pleases God (although what is criminal is also sometimes immoral by coincidence). Rather, it is framed within the language of rights and corollary obligations.
There are far more punishments exacted in Scripture for idolatry than any form of sexual misconduct, yet our government acknowledges (via tax exemptions) a wide and diverse array of religions as licit even as others view them as heretical or blasphemous (some folks still believe the Catholic Church to be the Whore of Babylon and the Eastern Orthodox to be Her somewhat less offensive sister).
In terms of “bringing on the Wrath of God”, I’m not sure what you mean. I see no obvious correlation between upholding Biblical morality and having material blessings in this life (although, once again, they can coincide). All of us, without exception, will endure hardships, illnesses and some form of poverty (either spiritually or materially) at some point. I wouldn’t draw conclusions about the character of a person from any misfortune they may happen to suffer.
James,
It doesn’t matter what the legal system is based upon. The issue for Christians, and for the R.C. Church, is what God declares. For example, it did ‘t matter to the early church that the Roman world and legal system was built on pagan ideals. Christians still insisted upon living and acting on Christian/Biblical principles.
As for the wrath of God coming upon nations and individuals who disobey the Lord, there are several examples in both the New and Old Testament. Also, from my experience as a pastor I have been involved in deliverances and healings in the name of Jesus. Many people that I encountered we’re suffering primarily because they were living in sexual sin as well as other sins and sinful attitudes. The way healings came into their lives was repentance, confession, absolution in Jesus’ name, and receiving deliverance. So the fact that wrath comes from disobedience is a proven fact in the work of ministry in this area, and on Scripture. It makes sense then that the church would seek to save those around them from the suffering that comes from disobedience.