You know, even though Garry Wills is calling him a murderous fellow who knows nothing about the "gospel of life and love" and has-been Robert Blair Kaiser fulminates in his new book, reviewed in this excerpt:

But a Great Deceiver lurks within the 250 pages of "A Church in Search of Itself," and his name was Joseph Ratzinger but is now Benedict XVI (always the shape-shifter). Kaiser makes no effort to hide his disgust for the new pope: At one hyperbolic point, he writes that the then-cardinal has "wolverine rings under his eyes." When Ratzinger finally emerges as Benedict XVI to address the throngs that had gathered at St. Peter, Kaiser writes: "They had hoped for someone as wide as all outdoors. Someone like John XXIII. Instead, they got a man they only knew as narrow."

If you believe Kaiser, Pope John Paul II was little more than Ratzinger’s puppet, someone whose only use was to wave to the television-watching masses; Ratzinger, meanwhile, nefariously expanded his power over the Catholic Church even as he publicly expressed no interest in becoming the Vicar of Christ. It’s a bold thesis, but Kaiser nails it by merely retelling the past. As Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (the technical name for the office that carried out the Inquisition), for instance, Ratzinger put a clamp on the liberation theology movement in Latin America during the 1980s, a gesture that ensured that Latin American churches would once again embrace the rich and ignore the poor. And even as John Paul II made nice with other religions, Ratzinger undermined his boss in 2000 by publishing Dominus Iesus, a 2000 document that stated that "there is no salvation outside the Church."

The case against Benedict XVI is strong, but the book reads best when it inspires, not angers. Thankfully, Kaiser returns to his clarion horn to close: "We can only hope that [the battle] is stirring now in the hearts of the people. … What will they win? A Church they can own — a simpler Church, the kind of Church Jesus the carpenter might like to drop in on."

(Note: review of Kaiser’s book is bitter about Catholicism, but its author, Gustavo Arellano, has been immersed in reporting on the corruption and abuses in the Orange County diocese for years now. It explains a lot)

ANYWAY – while these men, bitter that they’re not in charge since they obviously know better, propogate lies, caricatures and put their tone-deafness on stage for all to see…Pope Wolverine Eyes calmly does something that evidently would never occur to them to do in a lifetime: evangelize and teach. About, you know, Jesus:

From today’s General Audience:

"Thus the Apostles’ adventure began as an encounter between people who opened to one another," said Benedict XVI. "The disciples began to have a direct knowledge of the Master. Indeed, more than proclaiming an idea, they will be witnesses to the person of Christ. And before being sent to evangelize, they will have to ‘be’ with Jesus, establishing a personal relationship with Him. On this basis, evangelization will be nothing other than the announcement of what they experienced and an invitation to enter into the mystery of communion with Christ."