As one who did a doctorate in Catholic Moral Theology under Fr. Bernard Haring in Rome during the Second Vatican Council, and then later did a Ph.D. in History and Phenomenology of Religions, writing on The Buddhist Notion of Faith; as a Benedictine priest who later received a dispensation from my vows; and now as a grandfather who has lived in Japan for thirty-five years after completing four years of research at Kyoto University for my Ph.D. and then staying on in Japan as a Professor at Kansai University, I would like to point out how vastly Pope Benedict XVI’s teaching on “religious relativism” differs from the teachings of the Vatican Council at which both the pope and I were both present.

Especially in the Council’s Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions, that Council emphasized not only the direct and friendly association that must from now on exist with the Jews, of whom Christ was one, but also the brotherhood with all other religions in so far as they share in the moral and doctrinal teachings of the Catholic Church. I will not go on to talk about those sections of the Declaration on the Church, the Priesthood and many other issues that clearly intended to add a strong element of democracy to the structure of the whole Church.

The election of Pope John Paul II is known by all closely involved to have been a victory of the conservative elements of the Council, lead by the then head of the Holy Office (of the Inquisition), whose name was later changed to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith: Cardinal Ottaviani. John Paul II, especially in his “Dominus Jesus,” made a mockery of the spirit of the Council’s Declaration on Non-Christian Religions. It insulted the Buddhists here in Japan as well as the Christians who were trying to carry on a dialogue and various encounters with them, and all of the more liberal Catholic theologians all over the world. John Paul II’s Head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Ratzinger, had been a liberal theologian while at the Council, but being a timid man, turned arch-conservative when his classroom at the university was invaded by radical students in the seventies. Today, he remains basically of the same conservative mold—having led the charge to rid the Church’s institutions of higher learning of theologians like Hans Kung, Roger Haight, and a long list of others who dared to question a long list of teachings from the First Vatican Council, like papal infallibility (in spite of the fact that for centuries popes, like the Old and New Testament, had long sanctioned slavery and condemned the taking of interest on loans (“usury”)).

What Professor Lynch does not mention is that a very large percentage of today’s Catholics heartily approve of Liberation Theology, married priests, the ordination of women and the local election of bishops by the faithful whom they will lead (not created by totalitarian monarchical appointments from the Pope). And we won’t even mention the 75% of Catholics who totally refuse to obey the condemnation of birth control.

Organizations like Call to Action, the Voice of the Faithful and other similar groups all over the world represent the feelings of a very large percentage of Catholics—I would hazard a guess of something above 30%, perhaps much higher.

Catholics may also have come to see and cheer the head of their Church when he was in the U.S., but more than half of the really informed Catholics do not approve of Benedict XVI’s declarations that only the Roman Catholic Church holds the corner on the market of real and total religious truth.

I personally believe that Benedict himself knows these facts but, realizing that more than half of the most “faithful” Catholics are relatively uninformed on these matters and generally low in education in general, he speaks to the masses of Catholics. I see him as one who was elected to prevent a new schism in the Catholic Church, and so he does his best to please the crowds and go as easily as he can with the liberal half of the Church while still not failing to stay in step with his very popular—but disastrously conservative—predecessor.