With Both Hands

Sign in Subscribe

Popes

The Long View 2005-04-02: John Paul II

Joseph Ratzinger was John's second guess for Pope following John Paul II. He was elected, and himself elected not to follow the path of John Paul II into public incapacity. John Paul II As recently as Thursday night, I was deploring the way that the Vatican was allowing

The Long View: Earthly Powers

Some of John's central ideas about the Papacy are contained herein. The 18th and 19th centuries were a time of rampant nationalism in Europe, and the Pope was the head of the last institution that could effectively resist the nation-state. As the latter half of the nineteenth century