Benedict Sets Himself Up As Anti-Pope Or Lets Himself Be Made One, To Protect Clerical Despotism

I don't know to what extent Benedict XVI knows he is a figurehead of a right-wing neo-integralist movement, I wouldn't think calling it a neo-fascist  movement of Catholics is at all unfair.  I can't believe he is so mentally debilitated that he doesn't realize the use he is made of by them, it's been going on for at least three decades, now.  He, of course, takes the position that John Paul II had before he died and ceased to be a living figurehead for them, one who could be used as a weapon in current battles on current issues. 

I also don't know how much of this new book demanding clerical celibacy he wrote, the latest attack on Pope Francis and the likelihood that he will relax the rules on priestly celibacy in response to the pleas of Catholic bishops in many countries who see the Catholic church being decimated by the lack of priests as the celibate only priesthood turns into a relic of a past, despite decades of prayers and recruitment campaigns.  It isn't turning around and, I dare say, won't.  

I believe I'm right that Benedict XVI, as first Fr. Ratzinger, then as a bishop was never a pastor of a congregation, he never functioned as a parish priest, preferring to work as a professor of theology in a university, going directly from the artificial environment of the university directly into the ruling hierarchy to be tapped as John Paul II's enforcer on such matters as maintaining the enhanced clericalism that JPII favored.  And that is at the heart of his attack on the man who succeeded him when he performed the most responsible and popular act of his papacy,  his resignation.  His inability to break the stronghold of a corrupt Vatican clique, one that developed during the long papacy of JPII and his own was the definitive mark of his papacy,  That was until he made his rare decision to leave,  the only responsible course he could have taken.  Imagine the condition the Catholic church would be in if he and the henchmen he put or kept in place were still governing the Catholic church.  The sexual abuse scandal, alone, would have shattered it. 

The choice of Francis was seen, from as soon as he stepped out from behind the maroon curtains, not wearing the ridiculous clerical drag that Benedict favored and saying, "Good evening,"  as a good one in terms of pastoral care of The People of the church.   The biggest mistakes Francis has made, such as his defense of a Bishop who didn't deserve his defense, have generally been when he deferred too much to the clerics as opposed to The People, only he has quickly realized when those mistakes were mistakes.   Ratzinger's years as a theologian, then as JPII's enforcer would never have gotten him to that correction. 

I think if Pope Francis does not move to relax the rule on celibacy, the Catholic Church will suffer permanent damage, a trend that will continue for as long as the unmarried clerics maintain the power,  which is the primary motive of the clerical side of the neo-fascist movement mentioned above.  That is their motive, they know that as soon as married men are allowed to be priests*  the strangle-hold on power by the celebate clique they belong to will be broken, for good.  I think it is also an expression of the deep misogyny that is ubiquitous among them, something which is one of the mortal sins of the all-male power structure of the Catholic church.   

I think one of the primary beneficiaries of the maintenance of the all-male stranglehold on power in the official Roman Catholic church may well be the Women Priests movement and the Catholics in the growing Intentional Eucharistic Community movement who celebrate the liturgy as a community, sometimes led by decommissioned ordained Catholic men, by ordained Women or by lay people, often saying the prayers of consecration together as they break bread and pass the cup.  

Like it or not, the Catholic church is changing with or without the permission of the Pope.  Whether that is Benedict XVI or, yes, Good Pope Francis.  

* I have, of course, not seen the book which is coming out in a few days but I wonder if Ratzinger and his co-author will talk about JPII allowing married, ordained defecting Anglican priests to become fully authorized Catholic priests when he wanted to express his anger at Anglicans permitting the ordination of Women.  I, somehow, have a feeling that even the most accomplished academic theologian in the history of the papacy won't be able to explain his way out of that as he campaigns against married Catholic men having the same position that JPII gave to Anglicans.  

Update:  I should point out that as much of a reactionary in terms of Church policy and as he has allowed himself to become a tool of secular as well as clerical fascists, even Benedict XVI would be considered at least a moderate if not a leftist in American politics.  From a recent piece in The National Catholic Reporter: 

Our Catholic theology also leaves wide scope to the individual Catholic to choose her political preferences after having formed her conscience with the assistance of the teachings of the church. Historically, loyal Catholics have usually found their most suitable political home within the arms of parties on the left. I am guessing Burch and his colleagues at CatholicVote would disagree with these words:

" Democratic socialism managed to fit within the two existing models as a welcome counterweight to the radical liberal positions, which it developed and corrected. It also managed to appeal to various denominations. In England it became the political party of the Catholics, who had never felt at home among either the Protestant conservatives or the liberals. In Wilhelmine Germany, too, Catholic groups felt closer to democratic socialism than to the rigidly Prussian and Protestant conservative forces. In many respects, democratic socialism was and is close to Catholic social doctrine and has in any case made a remarkable contribution to the formation of a social consciousness. " 

These words are not mine. They were penned by Pope Benedict XVI.