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A second Counter-Reformation?
Posted by Christopher Shea
February 9, 2010 09:18 AM
In the American Conservative, William S. Lind argues that there's an opening for Pope Benedict to re-unite Christianity. The Pope's invitation to conservative Anglicans last fall to rejoin the Catholic church while retaining their own bishops and even many rites could be the first move, Lind thinks, in the realignment of the faith that would, at long last, sort out true Christians from "the politically correct" and "the cultural Marxism of the Frankfurt School." (The present division, Lind writes, is not denominational but "between those who believe the Christian faith was revealed and is to be received and those who think you just make it up to accord with the temper of the times.") If members of other denominations are granted some degree of strategic autonomy, all true Christians would once again be in full communion with Rome.
Pope Benedict XVI
To accomplish this end, however, the Pope ("a good German") must display the ruthlessness of the sort that Bismarck, uniter of Germany, displayed in the 19th century. "Be a Bismarck, Benedict, be a Bismarck," Lind writes. And they say it's liberals who cling to utopian dreams.
Pope Benedict XVI
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Joshua Rothman is a graduate student and Teaching Fellow in the Harvard English department, and an Instructor in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. He teaches novels and political writing.
Leon Neyfakh is the staff writer for Ideas. Amanda Katz is the deputy Ideas editor. Stephen Heuser is the Ideas editor.
Guest blogger Simon Waxman is Managing Editor of Boston Review and has written for WBUR, Alternet, McSweeney's, Jacobin, and others.
Guest blogger Elizabeth Manus is a writer living in New York City. She has been a book review editor at the Boston Phoenix, and a columnist for The New York Observer and Metro.
Guest blogger Sarah Laskow is a freelance writer and editor in New York City. She edits Smithsonian's SmartNews blog and has contributed to Salon, Good, The American Prospect, Bloomberg News, and other publications.
Guest blogger Joshua Glenn is a Boston-based writer, publisher, and freelance semiotician. He was the original Brainiac blogger, and is currently editor of the blog HiLobrow, publisher of a series of Radium Age science fiction novels, and co-author/co-editor of several books, including the story collection "Significant Objects" and the kids' field guide to life "Unbored."
Guest blogger Ruth Graham is a freelance journalist in New Hampshire, and a frequent Ideas contributor. She is a former features editor for the New York Sun, and has written for publications including Slate and the Wall Street Journal.
Joshua Rothman is a graduate student and Teaching Fellow in the Harvard English department, and an Instructor in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. He teaches novels and political writing.
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