I have watched with great dismay Benedict's attempts to both marginalize and co-opt rationality and reason. He attempts to marginalize it with his opposition to the "lesser evil" doctrine (which argues that condoms are a lesser evil for married women than getting HIV from HIV status partners who can force sex on them in a number of African nations). He also attempted to marginalize reason a couple of weeks again a speech on science and faith. His call for opposition to the Canadian legal acceptance of gay marriage also argued for accepting faith over reason/science, as does the Pope's insistence that Catholicism/Christianity be written into the European Union Charter.

The Platonic ideal of authoritarianism in the Catholic Church is hard to separate from the Paullist influence. Vatican II attempted to elevate Jesus's word and the Catholic conscience over Platonic autoritarianism. It was only allowed to go so far.

JPII also believed, to a certain extent, in Platonian authoritarianism. His ecumenical dialogues have defined limits. He kept ratzinger/Benedict as Defender of the faith because he believed in him.

The line between Platonic authoritarianism/Paulism and the clericalism is so fine it appears at time to be non-existant.

What a good question. You should take it to Beliefnet.com. I don't think it will get a good airing or serious discussion here.

MM,

Very interesting post, but I really see this as posts in one. The first post analyzes the current papal regime and its approach to the (undeniable) Hellenistic influences on Christianity.

Your other theme though is troublesome, and I quote from your post below:

"The deafness I refer to is that many here do not seem to understand how this appears to religious people who have been on the underside of the West's boot for living memory. A violent response to the Pope's comments is not so much a reflection of their religion as it is a reflection of their resentment of our direct repression (through maintaining dictatorships and economic hegemony over their resources) and of our cultural dominance, however conscious or unconscious, benevolent or otherwise. When you have been an underdog with no other means of demonstrating your outrage, violence will result whatever your religion."

By that logic, should not all "third worlders" be striking against the West with violence? After all, if religion is not a factor, why are three hundred million Latin Americans not supporting terrorist attacks on America (for example)?

If you restrict your argument to those outside of the Judeo-Christian tradition, the problem with your thesis remains. Haven't one billion Indians suffered at the hands of the West? Why are not Hindu religious leaders proclaiming violent jihad against Americans? What about the Vietnamese?

The fact is that every Islamic country is in conflict with non-Islamic countries on its borders, and every country with significant numbers of Muslims encounters problems between both communities (think Nigeria, Phillipines, Indonesia...) When a religion is defined as a comprehensive political and religious submission to a temporal and spiritual leader, and when the body of the faithful is set in opposition to the House of War (the rest of us), that would seem to explain the violence better than your tired "the evil West oppressed them" arugment.

This is yet another attempt to apologize for Muslim violence, when coercion against non-Muslims is the rotten core of that rotten religion.

His head and heart seem to be buried in books, history, and theology, and out of touch with the modern world and how people today think and react.

I agree. I see alot of elite liberals who are this way too. I have read my share of editorials from the Washington Post by people who have never left their hallowed enclaves of privelige and worked at a job where they actually have to get their hands dirty or associated with anyone outside of their own social class but want to set US policy that affects the rest of the world. These creatures come up with ideas that are quite dangerous and naive. I've met many who know alot of big words and went to fancy schools and can debate quite well but they have never lived in the real world. Neither has the Pope. Being cloistered off in a church in today's world sounds more like hiding. And hiding behind books is hiding. Sometimes I think working class people who have spent decades working with the public/real world but have also managed to educated themselves would be in the best positions to run things.

What would an old man in a dress know about on the job sexual harassment? What would a liberal elite know about the rural white poor not being able to get a job because of a lack or tranportation and not being able to afford transportation because of a lack of a job? Or getting a degree but not being able to get a job because of lack of social connections or an old boy network?