Indeed, it’s a bit of an oxymoron, “dictatorship of relativism”, isn’t it?

You’re absolutely right, Barbara. It’s obvious “relativism” is used here only as a substitute for “evil”, as anything not conforming to an authoritarian view of religion as the only absolute source and validation of all ethics, outside of it, no ethics, hence, all relativistically evil…

(Marxism definitely isn’t “relativist” by any other sense of the word! it’s the least likely candidate for the definition of “relativist”)

A “dictatorship of relativism” strictly speaking would have to be, something like, living under a dictatorship led by Aleister Crowley and the marquis de Sade, where everyone is encouraged, no, forced to do unspeakable things to their neighbours if it so pleases them, or even if it doesn’t. (I don’t know how that’d work).

If we had that, we’d all be dead already. We’d all have killed each other off. There’d be no police force because there’d be no law. There’d be no prisons because there’d be no crime - everything would be permissible and ok, any morals would be abolished and repressed, any social control abolished (not getting into the nature/nurture debate here, just positing a surreal scenario where all humans would be forced to abandon any kind of moral structure). So… how could that dictatorship even be in place? It would be the most absolute radical anarchy, of the kind never even theorised, nevermind existed.

But hey, it’s a powerful image, “dictatorship of relativism”. Scare people into thinking that if they think with their heads, they’re doomed. It always works.

I read yesterday that in Brazil, the Catholic church loses about 1 million followers a year to fundamentalist evangelical Christians and the like. The phenomenon is present also across the rest of Latin America, and Africa, too. The Vatican doesn’t appreciate this, obviously. Solution? become more like the strongest competitors, and screw the social and political consequences of pouring more water on that kind of fire.

I interpret Ratzinger to be saying that faith in Christ and Christian orthodoxy (by his interpretation) is the highest and best human achievement, even necessary for a person to be fully human. I certainly can understand why he thinks that. I would be shocked if he didn’t.

But it turns reason on its head to think that there is a dictatorship of relativism because (a) there is a great deal of ferment of religious and spiritual thought, and even adherence to atheism, or out and out selfi-interest and epicureanism and (b) individuals are permitted to and do err from Ratzinger’s doctrinal pronouncement of the greatest good.

There is no such thing as a dictatorship of relativism. By his own reckoning, relativism is chaotic, non-uniform, and ultimately personal. Ratzinger appears to be saying that any political or spiritual direction that does not result in uniform adoption of his brand of orthodox Christianity is dictatorial. In other words, he is being oppressed because the dictates (sometimes known as principles) of a liberal state prevent him from dictating the personal conscience of others.

You give people the right to choose. Sometimes they choose wrongly. This is not an argument for taking away freedom of conscience. The alternative is to permit no conscience.

CARDINAL JOSEPH RATZINGER
HOMILY AT THE MASS FOR THE ELECTION OF THE ROMAN PONTIFF
(partial insert)
How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking… The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves - thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism, and so forth. Every day new sects are created and what Saint Paul says about human trickery comes true, with cunning which tries to draw those into error (cf Eph 4, 14). Having a clear faith, based on the Creed of the Church, is often labeled today as a 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. We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal one’s own ego and one’s own desires.

However, we have a different goal: the Son of God, true man. He is the measure of true humanism. Being an “Adult” means having a faith which does not follow the waves of today’s fashions or the latest novelties. A faith which is deeply rooted in friendship with Christ is adult and mature. It is this friendship which opens us up to all that is good and gives us the knowledge to judge true from false, and deceit from truth. We must become mature in this adult faith; we must guide the flock of Christ to this faith. And it is this faith - only faith - which creates unity and takes form in love. On this theme, Saint Paul offers us some beautiful words - in contrast to the continual ups and downs of those were are like infants, tossed about by the waves: (he says) make truth in love, as the basic formula of Christian existence. In Christ, truth and love coincide. To the extent that we draw near to Christ, in our own life, truth and love merge. Love without truth would be blind; truth without love would be like “a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal” (1 Cor 13,1).

the entire homily can be read here
(scroll down) http://www.hughhewitt.com/index.htm#postdid1557
A list of some of his works are here.
http://www.ratzingerfanclub.com/Ratzinger_In_Print.html

* no I’m not talking of the good old inquisition (one never expects the Spanish Inquisition!) but much more recent events in Latin America. Where the Catholic nuns and priests, including one bishop, who was actually a conservative, who, along with many other lay dissenters, were tortured and killed by the death squads of right wing regimes that the Vatican supported as a bulwark against communism, have not only failed to be included in the list of recently beatified exponents of the faith, despite their being perfect candidates for the definition of martyrs, but have not even been awarded as much as a mention from the Vatican officialdom. It’s one of those things best shoved under the carpet.

Ratzinger is one of the strongest representatives of this ultra-apologist approach, he also opposed those public apologies that Wojtyla made for the past sins of the Church during the Jubilee (including the apology to Galileo - Giordano Bruno is still waiting…); he always opposed inter-religious meetings that Wojtyla promoted, like that of a couple of years ago in Assisi, for fear they might spread the terrible idea that there is a possibility of inter-religious dialogue even with churches that are not officially considered sisters of the Catholic church.

Of course, all these statements, because of their lack of 100% acritical worship of a religious, political and financial institution with a very mixed history, are to be easily dismissed as “ignorant” by the Ratzinger wannabes. There is only one truth, and it is that which covers up hundreds of cynical strategies and crimes committed in the name of “fighting relativism”.

The criticisms of the new Pope, in this thread?

Ratzinger’s idea of supreme evil appears to emanate from his notion of “relativism,”? which is (so far as I understand it … it’s not like it’s well defined) the notion that circumstances or personal situation are morally relevant in guiding ethical choices in addition to or even rather than timeless or enduring principles of right and wrong.

I don’t know what Ratzinger has stated about relativism, but the problem with it is that it adds up to “anything goes.” Your truth is not my truth, relativism goes, so there are no absolutes. In other words, murder is not objectively immoral; it is immoral only for those people who consider it to be so.

It was 1944 with a full blown war and extermination of Jews. I seriously doubt he was as naive and babified as a 14-year-old in 2005. Besides, he was in seminary at this age too.

My real point though is the decision by the body of the church that it is far worse to be female. They seem to be saying “boys will be boys”; that the wars and the results of wars that men instigate, fight, and win are somehow necessary (and therefore good) and that there are rules of ethics therewith which don’t extend to the realities and lives of women. Women are judged on their birth. Men, on the other hand, may or may not be judged for what they *do* in their life times.

My vagina, in the eyes of the Catholic church, constrains my ability to lead or to form an intimate or organic relationship with God. Ratzinger’s youth and the apparent cumpolsory nature of the Hitler Youth get him off the ethics/spiritual hook in a way my female body can’t.

I too could talk about my past for 20 years and the Catholic Church would still only see my vagina.

Although I never anticipate agreement on abortion, I think this might be highly relevant to one’s views on the use of contraception, particularly of condoms by married women trying to avoid life threatening diseases, but really, in any circumstance. And the coup de grace, perhaps, is that the Church (I don’t know about Ratzinger personally) has made all kinds of situationally based excuses for abusive priests. In other words, the priestly class has shown a marked lack of empathy for other people’s situations and and almost exquisite sensibility to the situations of its own peers.

It is extremely troubling and does not bode well.

And, if I am to put his past into context, I want to be able to define that context… say perhaps to compare him to Dietrich Bonhoeffer rather than some modern day version of youthful innocence.