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  tom-grubisich

  Sept. 17, 2006, 7:57 p.m.

  Benedict used this occasion -- an address at Regensburg University, where he taught for many years -- to put his imprint on his papacy. This is explained more expertly than I could do in Vatican observer John Allen's report in the National Catholic Reporter, http://nationalcatholicreporter.org/word. What I would add is that Benedict packed too much into his address. His primary audience was Europeans who have deserted Catholicism in droves. He's trying to engage them through spirited, intellectual, cafe-style discussion (think Sartre but also Mauriac), which was not John Paul II's amphitheatre-staged style. Very admirable; it forces secularists to think about a hellenizized faith that involves reason as well as "the Word." But why, just as he was about to launch into his argument, did Benedict throw this spitball at Islam? He should have taken his thoughts about Islam privately, at least at first, to its leaders.

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