Pope Benedict XVI
Relativism, other 'isms' are longtime enemies
Pope Benedict XVI addresses the College of Cardinals. His criticism of philosophies that see faith as subject to personal interpretation hints at steps he may take to nip their popularity.
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In what may have been a history-changing homily, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger railed against the army of "isms" that failed to sink the "small boat" of Christian thought: Marxism, liberalism, libertinism, collectivism, radical individualism, atheism, vague religious mysticism, agnosticism, syncretism.
And now, he said, clear faith is somehow labeled as fundamentalism.
"Whereas, relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and swept along by every wind of teaching, looks like the only attitude acceptable to today's standards," he said before opening the conclave to elect successor to Pope John Paul II.
The next day he became Pope Benedict XVI.
To better understand the new pope's longtime battle against relativism -- the view that Christian truth is not absolute and that other belief systems may be true in different times and places -- one might consider the case of the Rev. Roger Haight, a veteran Jesuit theologian. Only two months ago, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which Ratzinger headed, told Haight that he could no longer teach Catholic theology.
Haight's 1999 book, "Jesus Symbol of God," suggested that in the modern, pluralistic world, the Catholic Church should be willing to see God's presence and the possibility of salvation in other religions. In doing so, he also explained the Trinity as one "symbol" of God.
Haight's thesis likely represents one form of the relativism the new pope detests, as it seeks to create a new understanding of Christianity for a new world.
Haight's case may offer insight to laypeople on what Benedict XVI means by the "dictatorship of relativism" and on the steps he is willing to take to stem its growth. No one knows what kind of pope Benedict will be, but Ratzinger's track record indicates that he may not always agree with the sweeping cultural and religious pluralism so many Americans prize.
"I think Ratzinger and John Paul II asked the question of how we tell the truth of the Gospel in the face of all these 'isms,' many of which they rightly critique for damaging the human person," said Elena Procario-Foley, the Driscoll professor of Jewish-Catholic Studies at Iona College in New Rochelle, N.Y. "But then you get to Roger Haight's book, which addresses the centrality of Jesus and the future of interreligious dialogue, and it gets difficult."
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