Garry Wills speaks. It’s an interview on a Boston-area radio show, pointed out to us in a comment below.

He’s speaking, of course, about his new book What Jesus meant, reviewed here in First Things.

I am officially tired of the Pontifical Stylings of Garry Wills. What it seems that we have here is a very smart guy extremely frustrated that he is not in charge of the world, or at least the Catholic Church. Because, you know, he’s smart. And he prays the rosary every day. And he digs St. Augustine.

What is maddening about Wills is how his intelligence just seems to take a nap sometimes. Goes into a deep, deep slumber. It’s Popes that do it –

Take this interview – there is no transcript, you have to listen – it’s about 15 minutes long. There’s some good stuff at the beginning – a reminder that Jesus is not properly seen as an ethical teacher, but as one who comes to bring us to the the Father, through himself.  He is not a political figure, either, and Wills takes on both left and right on this score. Fine.

But then, he gets going on popes, and seems to lose it, bit by bit. What is so confounding is this historian’s sudden and total loss of historical context when he speaks of the papacy, and his insistence on setting up this bifurcation between the "Popes" who were (his take) often corrupt, issued statements that were wrongs, etc…and, on the other hand, the "People of God" who are the Real Church.

Well, I’m not going to get all ecclesiological on you here – you’re free to do so yourself – but that division of categories is just shockingly mindless. How do the "People of God" become Church? Well, mebbe through, you know baptism. And then they are bound to Christ and to each other via, you know, the Eucharist. Actions which do not just pop up out of the blue from their midst, but which are administered in the context of a structure. Sorry, Garr. And how do the "People of God" learn about this Jesus whom they follow? Just from the intuitions planted in their own head? Does anyone, you know, teach them about it? Where does this teaching come from?

He also has a very, very weird digression on natural law, which I didn’t quite understand, in which he starts out by saying that since the Gospels don’t mention homosexuality, abortion, and contraception, thinking on them is not derived from revelation, but from natural law, and "the Popes" have no authority to decree on natural law. Or something.

But here’s the kicker. It starts at about 12:21, and I’ve transcribed it, I think, accurately:

Wills: There is..a message of life and love in the New Testament. Little of that comes out of Rome now. People are dying of AIDS all around the world now especially in places like Africa and Indonesia now, …when the Pope refuses to allow people to have contraception, he’s killing them. He’s responsible for murder. This is hardly a gospel of life and love.

Interviewer: You say that Pope Benedict is responsible for murder?

Wills: Sure, sure. More people are more resentful and hateful toward the Catholic Church because of that than because of the sexual molestation problem…sexual molesters are terrible it’s..you know here in Boston, but for the most part, not always, but for the most part they didn’t kill people. This is killing people on a grand scale, and it’s a horrendous scandal, much greater than any sexual molestation scandal.

Pope Benedict: responsible for the HIV-infection of the masses because the men who rape and sexually exploit girls, prostitutes and their wives have the Catholic teaching against contraceptive use in mind as they rape and exploit.

I thought so.