The New Shepherd

By Nancy Gibbs

Pope Benedict XVI thinks the church is like a symphony orchestra. Both abide by strict rules designed to promote both majesty and mystery. Both have many parts but one glorious message; many players but one leader they all must follow. And like a Pope, a conductor is applauded before he lifts the baton.

Even though Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger had been proclaimed the front runner, Pope John Paul II's strong right hand, he was an introvert, bookish, had always been able to walk from his apartment to the Vatican without attracting much notice. But that would all change just three days after his 78th birthday, when the papal conclave's fourth ballot gave him the two-thirds vote of the Cardinals needed to become the 265th Pope. Crowds milled in St. Peter's Square, watching the tin chimney, waiting for the white smoke that would signal a choice had been made. Inside the Sistine Chapel the Cardinals wrestled with the stove in the corner just left of the entrance.

"They were trying to get enough chemicals on the fire to make the smoke white," recalls Chicago's Francis Cardinal George. "The stove backed up, pouring smoke into the chapel." Outside, when the first tendrils appeared, they were gray and vague. But in time they whitened, and then the bells pealed, and people came running into the square from all directions to hear the news, "Habemus Papam!" We have a Pope! And then the transformation began.

A wave of welcome came washing over the small man who stepped out onto the balcony. "Viva il Papa!" the crowd chanted, and he smiled, raised his hands and circled his arms, like a large bird at lift-off. Typical Pope behavior, but not typical of Ratzinger. In fact, he used to wonder whether the Holy Spirit was really in charge of these decisions, given how many Popes throughout history had been the kind of men of whom the Spirit would hardly approve. "You know, we believe grace comes with the office," said Cardinal George. "When he came out on the balcony and started waving his arms, I thought, 'It's working! I've never seem him make those gestures before!'"

When that first audience was over, the new Pope and his Cardinals dined on bean soup, veal cordon bleu and ice cream, offered their new leader a champagne toast and sang to him, the lover of Mozart, their many languages finding one in common.

And so the concert begins.

For the past few weeks the commentariat had debated the merits of a red or blue Pope, a progressive or a conservative, First World or Third, a creature of the future or the past. The last conclave had occurred in the pre-cable-news dark ages, which allowed for a measure of mystery. This election took place in the glare of the 24-hour media and was so swift and smooth that the Cardinals' message seemed clear. By picking a traditionalist, they get continuity; by choosing an experienced manager, they restore administrative discipline; in a 78-year-old who has had a cerebral hemorrhage, they get, in effect, a transitional figure. In an old Pope from old Europe rather than a fresh face from the thriving Third World church, the Vatican seemed to be making a last stand to win Europe back for Jesus.

To the media, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Having just discovered the depth of emotion that a beloved Pope can evoke, many pundits were amazed that the Cardinals could resist offering up another "rock star." If John Paul II was idealized in his final days, Benedict faced an impossible contrast. Even his name--the old one, Ratzinger--sounded to many like some mutant hornet, and his past did not have the heroic arc of his predecessor's. The Sun of London headlined his bio, from hitler youth to papa ratzi. His Vatican office, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the newspapers noted, used to be called the Inquisition; he was dubbed God's Rottweiler. The Panzer Cardinal. And so forth. Where was the pastoral tenderness, the charisma, the charm? To read the reviews, it was as though Benedict XVI had done the one unforgivable thing--he was not John Paul 3.0.

So while there were certainly many faithful fans ready to welcome the anointed successor--there was so much demand for Benedict XVI souvenir T shirts and beer mugs that ratzingerfanclub.com crashed--the wider ripple of reaction, especially across the rutted spiritual expanse of Western Europe and the U.S., was more complicated. Would he welcome intellectual challenge and inquiry or banish critics and crush dissent? How can he declare other religions deficient but then be open-minded and eager to reach out to other faiths? ANTI-TURKISH POPE, said the headline of the Cumhuriyet newspaper in Istanbul, where many recalled Ratzinger's opposition to Turkey's joining the European Union on the grounds that a country of 68 million Muslims would dilute Western Europe's Christian heritage.

Some found reassurance in his first papal homily, with its moist themes of inclusion, collegiality, continuity and hope. "I address everyone with simplicity and affection," he said, "to assure them that the church wants to continue to build an open and sincere dialogue with them, in a search for the true good of mankind and of society." Longtime colleagues defended the power of his intellect: this was a man who could improvise jokes in Latin, a walking theological encyclopedia. They rejected the image of a cold and ruthless oppressor. "He is gentle in his personal dealings," says Father Peter Gumpel, a Vatican-based German priest who has known Ratzinger since the early '60s. "If you talk about an inquisitor, that's a stern man. And that's not the case. He is firm on principles. But he listens, listens to everybody."

He is, however, also known to embrace a Benedictine motto, Succisa virescit (Pruned, it grows again), which has led some people to wonder how sharp are his shears, how deep might he cut. He has raised the prospect of shrinking the church back to its true believers and rejecting in firm sorrow all those who call themselves Catholic without accepting the obligations of the faith. And what exactly might that mean for the Pope's often restless American flock? Paul Wilkes, 66, a liberal Catholic author who has wrestled with the challenge of progressivism in the church, said Ratzinger's election "makes it more difficult for Joe and Mary Catholic--who are trying to raise their kids Catholic, but they use [birth] control, have friends who are divorced or are divorced themselves, know people who have had abortions--this is very, very distressing for them. It just indicates that the church still has not heard these people." While the church has taught doctrine for centuries, Wilkes noted, "it has also taught that the free exercise of human conscience is the ultimate arbiter of our Catholic lives." But that's not in Ratzinger's lexicon. "This 'my-way-or-the-highway, let-them-become-Episcopalians' attitude is harmful to a Catholic Church that is supposed to be a wide, sprawling tent," said Wilkes.

Conservatives rather enjoyed the discomfort of liberals, seeing it as confirmation of the wisdom of the choice and the ignorance that finds it surprising that a deeply conservative institution actually picked a deeply conservative man to lead it. "These reformisti inhabit a world of their own," said Father Joseph Fessio, head of Ignatius Press in San Francisco. "They waited for years for John Paul to die and maybe install one of their own, and then he finally died, and who do they get? John Paul in spades!" Such supporters reject the idea that the new Pope was some kind of enemy of freedom or modernity. "Pope Benedict XVI does not have a dour, gloomy view of the future," argues Father Richard John Neuhaus, editor of First Things, an interfaith journal. "He has the tranquil confidence which is faith. Homosexuality, abortion, women priests--forget it. Those are only distractions." Indeed Pope Benedict had already moved on: greeting and hugging kids outside the Vatican, writing his very first letter to the chief rabbi in Rome, and wooing the press with the implicit promise that he too would be a great story.