Sacred Mysteries: A month on from Pope Benedict's welcome to Britain, Christopher Howse weighs the effect
The Queen 'united in conviction' with Pope Benedict Photo: GETTY IMAGES
When the Pope visited Britain last month some said that everything had changed for good. That is not true in the sense of the nation being converted to the paths of righteousness. And there was also something which changed for the time being. That was the easy ride enjoyed by a small number of atheist zealots, the usual suspects, who had mocked him in the much the way that alternative comedians once mocked Mrs Thatcher.
What changed permanently is surely the reputation (more than just image) of Pope Benedict. However long he continues as Bishop of Rome, he will be known in Britain not as an isolated authoritarian hankering for lost glory, but as a thoughtful man, a little shy, never happier (except perhaps when listening to music, as at Westminster Abbey or when saying his prayers) than in discussing how the Church and state might work for the common good.
A turning-point was the address to both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall. It wasn't just that his audience applauded him after his speech as he walked through the historic building. This was remarkable enough, given the historic roots of a part of parliamentarianism in the rejection of popery. But the friendly gesture was not the distinguishing note of the occasion – after all, the Queen herself, welcoming him to Scotland had spoken of being "united in conviction" with him about the freedom to worship being "at the core of our tolerant and democratic society".
No, the decisive moment at Westminster Hall was when the Pope denied for the Church the role of supplying "the objective norms governing right action", let alone proposing "concrete political solutions". The latter point should have been clear, since Catholics sit with conviction on both sides of the House of Commons. But it might have been thought that the Church ought to supply the moral underpinning.
Not so, the Pope insisted. The answer to the question "Where is the ethical foundation for political choices to be found?" was that it was to be supplied by reason, without the privilege of divine revelation.
Certainly, reason could be distorted, as the "totalitarian ideologies of the 20th century" showed. And that was why "the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief need one another and should not be afraid to enter into a profound and ongoing dialogue, for the good of our civilisation". This was a thousand miles from the exploded caricature of Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope, as a dogmatic rottweiler.
There were, naturally, moments of entirely spiritual witness – not least when 80,000 people at Hyde Park fell silent as the Pope led them in unspoken prayer to Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament.
Another striking scene came when this old man invited a crowd of schoolchildren – and all the young people in the land – to set their ambitions upon becoming saints. "Once you enter into friendship with God," he told them, "everything in your life begins to change."
Pope Benedict did not just preach to the converted. After their meeting (by coincidence at the beginning of the Day of Atonement), the Chief Rabbi, Lord Sacks, moved by the Pope's commitment to Catholic-Jewish relations, said: "It was an epiphany. Soul touched soul across the boundaries of faith."
Those words echoed the motto – Cor ad cor loquitur – of the man the Pope had come to beatify, John Henry Newman. Now, after the beatification, previous objections to it seem petty.
Luckily, the Pope's speeches were not couched in the jargon-ridden half-Latin that once characterised English translations of encyclicals. They are online at thepapalvisit.org and, with colour pictures and reflections by figures who met him, in Benedict XVI and Blessed John Henry Newman, edited by Peter Jennings (CTS, £14.95).
Not so, the Pope insisted. The answer to the question "Where is the ethical foundation for political choices to be found?" was that it was to be supplied by reason, without the privilege of divine revelation.
Certainly, reason could be distorted, as the "totalitarian ideologies of the 20th century" showed. And that was why "the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief need one another and should not be afraid to enter into a profound and ongoing dialogue, for the good of our civilisation". This was a thousand miles from the exploded caricature of Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope, as a dogmatic rottweiler.
There were, naturally, moments of entirely spiritual witness – not least when 80,000 people at Hyde Park fell silent as the Pope led them in unspoken prayer to Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament.
Another striking scene came when this old man invited a crowd of schoolchildren – and all the young people in the land – to set their ambitions upon becoming saints. "Once you enter into friendship with God," he told them, "everything in your life begins to change."
Pope Benedict did not just preach to the converted. After their meeting (by coincidence at the beginning of the Day of Atonement), the Chief Rabbi, Lord Sacks, moved by the Pope's commitment to Catholic-Jewish relations, said: "It was an epiphany. Soul touched soul across the boundaries of faith."
Those words echoed the motto – Cor ad cor loquitur – of the man the Pope had come to beatify, John Henry Newman. Now, after the beatification, previous objections to it seem petty.
Luckily, the Pope's speeches were not couched in the jargon-ridden half-Latin that once characterised English translations of encyclicals. They are online at thepapalvisit.org and, with colour pictures and reflections by figures who met him, in Benedict XVI and Blessed John Henry Newman, edited by Peter Jennings (CTS, £14.95).