Is the Pope a CEO?
February 27, 2013
THE resignation of Pope Benedict XVI makes no sense to me. It is similar to a father appearing to his children one morning and saying, “Look, I am getting old. I am resigning from this position.” At Tradition in Action, Atila Sinke Guimarães makes this point and says Benedict’s resignation has turned the papacy into a job. He writes:
Someone told me a comment of a simple woman off the street about Pope Ratzinger’s abdication. She said: “I considered him to be my Father; isn’t this what a Pope is? But how can a father resign from his mission? A father is always a father, just as a daughter is always a daughter. It is a reality inherent to the person … it is impossible to resign from this. It is absurd.”
—- Comments —
Alissa writes:
Some liberal Christians, racial liberals and multiculturalists want the next Pope to be African or even Native American. I pray to God that this does not occur.
David C. writes:
“A father is always a father, just as a daughter is always a daughter. It is a reality inherent to the person.”
Well, Pope Benedict XVI has not resigned from his personhood. He will still be a father to us in Christ, only now he is going to serve us through prayer and penance in his final years. In the end, prayer and penance may be the best contribution one person can make to the well-being of another.
It must be evident that our use of the name ‘father’ to refer to our popes has its limitations. For instance, when one such ‘father’ dies, we immediately accept the next one in his place. If I had truly accepted Pope John Paul II as my father, in all the implications of that word, I would never have accepted Pope Benedict XVI in his place, because no one can replace your father. We don’t apply unlimited meaning in using the word father to describe a pope.
Laura writes:
Well, Pope Benedict XVI has not resigned from his personhood. He will still be a father to us in Christ, only now he is going to serve us through prayer and penance in his final years.
You seem to be saying there will now be two popes. Also, he could have continued that spiritual role as pope.
It must be evident that our use of the name ‘father’ to refer to our popes has its limitations. For instance, when one such ‘father’ dies, we immediately accept the next one in his place.
Well, obviously I did not mean that a pope is in all senses like a father, but the analogy still applies because when a father dies it is much easier to accept another man in his place. The vital point is that Benedict is still very much alive.
