Pope Benedict XVI (born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger; 16 April 1927) reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church from 2005 to 2013. After a long career as an academic and professor of theology at several German universities, in 1981 he was appointed Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, one of the most important dicasteries of the Roman Curia. Prior to becoming Pope, he was “a major figure on the Vatican stage for a quarter of a century”; he had an influence “second to none when it came to setting church priorities and directions” as one of John Paul II’s closest confidants. His prolific writings defend traditional Catholic doctrine and values. On 11 February 2013, Benedict announced his resignation in a speech in Latin before the cardinals, citing a “lack of strength of mind and body” due to his advanced age. In his retirement, Benedict XVI has made occasional public appearances alongside Pope Francis. (More from Wikipedia)
John Lennon made the Beatles an easy target by his remark, but the fact is that church attendance was declining in England and elsewhere in Europe, a pattern that continued in the US some years later. Although Pope Paul VI denounced Lennon’s statement (and actually Pope Benedict XVI apologized for this church stance in 2010), there were few church leaders joining the denunciation of the Beatles, since the Church was going through an intense period of re-examination in this time period. For example, the Jesuit newspaper America wrote about the controversy: “[John] Lennon was simply stating what many a Christian educator would readily admit.”
Earlier that year, on April 8, 1966, the cover of Time magazine famously asked: “Is God Dead?” Pope John XXIII convened the Second Vatican Council on October 11, 1962, an earthshaking event in the Roman Catholic Church that attempted to re-frame Catholic teachings in a modern context, leading (among many other major changes) to services being conducted in the language of the people attending rather than Latin. The ramifications remain strongly controversial to this day.
(September 2014)
