In This Article
30-Second Summary
Headline Links: On plane to U.S., pope comments on sex abuse scandal
Background: Benedict confronts American politics and secularism
Biography: Joseph Ratzinger’s life, papacy and beliefs
Opinion & Analysis: Popes past and present, media portrayals of religious leaders
Reference: The pope’s U.S. itinerary
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Pope Speaks to UN
by
findingDulcinea Staff
Pope Benedict XVI addressed the United Nations General Assembly on Friday, stating that the international community must defend human rights abroad.
30-Second Summary
With stops in Washington, D.C. and New York City, the pope’s itinerary has included a visit at the White House, meetings with U.S. bishops and representatives of other faiths, and an address to the United Nations.
The United States has the world’s third-largest population of Catholics, but the country poses unique challenges for the conservative pontiff, including the lingering scandal over the sexual abuse of children by priests, a plunge in church membership, and the preeminence of “America’s secular, polyglot culture,” according to McClatchy.
Pope Benedict XVI, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, has been at the helm of Catholicism since April, 2005.
His tour will allow Americans their first close look at Pope Benedict, who turns 81 on April 16. Although 52 percent of Americans have a favorable view of Benedict, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey, 30 percent say they “do not know enough about him to offer an opinion.”
When Cardinal Ratzinger first assumed the papacy, he was seen as “God’s Rottweiler” for his conservatism and insistence on “doctrinal correctness,” a 2007 New York Times Magazine article says, but Benedict now plays “the roles of pastor and father.”
The Pope is also noted for his academic prowess.
“(Pope) John Paul made you burst into tears, Benedict makes you think,” Peggy Noonan of The Wall Street Journal writes. “It is more pleasurable to weep, but at the moment, perhaps it is more important to think.”
The United States has the world’s third-largest population of Catholics, but the country poses unique challenges for the conservative pontiff, including the lingering scandal over the sexual abuse of children by priests, a plunge in church membership, and the preeminence of “America’s secular, polyglot culture,” according to McClatchy.
Pope Benedict XVI, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, has been at the helm of Catholicism since April, 2005.
His tour will allow Americans their first close look at Pope Benedict, who turns 81 on April 16. Although 52 percent of Americans have a favorable view of Benedict, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey, 30 percent say they “do not know enough about him to offer an opinion.”
When Cardinal Ratzinger first assumed the papacy, he was seen as “God’s Rottweiler” for his conservatism and insistence on “doctrinal correctness,” a 2007 New York Times Magazine article says, but Benedict now plays “the roles of pastor and father.”
The Pope is also noted for his academic prowess.
“(Pope) John Paul made you burst into tears, Benedict makes you think,” Peggy Noonan of The Wall Street Journal writes. “It is more pleasurable to weep, but at the moment, perhaps it is more important to think.”
Headline Links: On plane to U.S., pope comments on sex abuse scandal
Pope Benedict addressed the United Nations General Assembly in a half-hour speech Friday, emphasizing the responsibility to secure human rights and lessen inequality throughout the world. According to Bloomberg.com, "Diplomats said Benedict expressed his support for intervention in language unlikely to create controversy because he borrowed from declarations that have been unanimously adopted by UN member governments."
Source: Bloomberg.com
Pope Benedict XVI led mass at the stadium of the Washington Nationals on Thursday to a crowd of 46,000 and commented on the scandal involving Catholic priests in America.
Source: The Washington Times
The pope turned 81 on Wednesday and he spent most of his birthday at the White House. The Associated Press reported, “at least 9,000 excited guests gathered on the White House's South Lawn for a 21-gun salute, a famed soprano's rendition of ‘The Lord's Prayer’ and an emotional presidential welcome.”
Source: MSNBC
Aboard his Alitalia flight en route from Rome to Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, Pope Benedict said he “was ‘deeply ashamed’ of the sex abuse scandal that stained the Catholic church and will work to make sure pedophiles don’t become priests,” The Associated Press reported.
Source: Daily News
The Washington Post has updated news about Pope Benedict’s visit to the United States in its “Pope Watch” section.
Source: The Washington Post
Background: Benedict confronts American politics and secularism
Issues during Benedict’s tour
The political implications of the pope’s U.S. trip in an election year are still unclear, and his beliefs have coincided with those of both Democrats and Republicans in the past. For example, Benedict opposes stem cell research but he also has objected to the war in Iraq.
Source: Los Angeles Times
The Council of Foreign Relations offers an interview with Timothy Samuel Shah, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Religion and Foreign Policy. Shah says the pope will avoid inciting the Muslim community like he did with a controversial speech last year, and the pontiff will be trying to mend his relationship with Jews, especially after he brought back a Good Friday prayer calling for their conversion to Christianity.
Source: Council on Foreign Relations
Americans and the pope
Pope Benedict’s trip will confront a number of issues specific to America, such as the Catholic priest sex scandal, the drop in church membership, and the secular nature of Americans.
Source: McClatchy
Even though Joseph Ratzinger’s car got rear-ended at JFK Airport when he visited as a cardinal, he still speaks fondly of New York City and the United States, and the multicultural heritage they represent. Raphaela Schmid of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty said, “It’s about people being two things at once, like Italian Americans or Chinese Americans. He’s interested in that idea of coexistence.”
Source: Time
The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press reports, “the pope remains unfamiliar to a relatively large number of Americans. In a survey conducted by the Center, “Favorable opinions of Pope John Paul II consistently outnumbered unfavorable views by much wider margins than is the case for Pope Benedict XVI.”
Source: Pew Research Center
Biography: Joseph Ratzinger’s life, papacy and beliefs
CBS has an interactive feature on Pope Benedict XVI, providing a timeline of his path to the papacy, information on his trip to Turkey and facts about the 15 other popes who took the name Benedict.
Source: CBS
A New York Times Magazine article from April 2007 describes one of Pope Benedict’s major beliefs: “The mistaken conviction that reason and faith are two distinct realms has weakened Europe and has brought it to the verge of catastrophic collapse.” Although Benedict has a conservative history in the Church, stressing the importance of “doctrinal correctness” including the prohibition of birth control and the ban on women receiving ordination, he now plays “the roles of pastor and father.”
Source: The New York Times
Opinion & Analysis: Popes past and present, media portrayals of religious leaders
‘Something Beautiful Has Begun’
Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict are clearly very different, Peggy Noonan writes in a Wall Street Journal piece. “John Paul made you burst into tears. Benedict makes you think. It is more pleasurable to weep, but at the moment, perhaps it is more important to think.”
Source: The Wall Street Journal
‘Pope Is Coming, as Is Clichéd Coverage in the Media’
A March 29 article from The New York Times analyzed how the media tends to portray the pope through a clichéd lens. According to the article, “part of the problem in getting a fix on Benedict is simply the feebleness of accepted categories for understanding any serious religious leaders — and hence the impulse to deal with them as celebrities or politicians.”
Source: The New York Times
‘American Benediction’
Michael Novak of the American Enterprise Institute argues that Pope Benedict opted to come to the White House during an election year because the “Vatican has never had a better friend in the White House than George W. Bush—not only in defending the sanctity of human life, but in exposing the reflexive leftism … of many international organizations, and in stressing the importance of religious liberty in the Middle East and elsewhere.”
Source: American Enterprise Institute
Reference: The pope’s U.S. itinerary
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops provides an itinerary of Pope Benedict’s trip from Tuesday, April 15 through Sunday, April 20. The site also has links with ticket information for the pope’s public appearances in Washington, D.C. and New York City.
Source: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
The Vatican’s Web site has information about Benedict and his U.S. tour. Throughout the trip, the site will post the text of his speeches.
Source: The Vatican
The findingDulcinea Catholicism Web Guide offers the best links on Catholic beliefs, practices, history, and issues. It also helps Catholics connect online.
Source: findingDulcinea
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