A Portrait of the Critic as a Churchman: Joseph Ratzinger and the Catholization of the Modernity Project

Karma Ben Johanan
Issue 52 | Summer 2020
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This article deals with the contemporary Catholic Church’s ambivalent view of the relation between Christianity and secular modernity, as this ambivalence is expressed in the philosophy of the theologian, man of the church hierarchy and pope, Joseph Ratzinger, known as Pope Benedict XVI (2005–2013). Ratzinger criticized the set of relations between the church and European secularism and proposed a new model of the divisions of labor between believers and secular people. Within this set of relations, criticism has a key role in forming a dialogue between “the two great cultures of the West, the culture of Christian faith and that of secular rationality.”

In this article I argue that Ratzinger accepted the enlightened criticism of the church and that his thinking lies within a Catholic tradition that has already undergone a deep process of modernization. At the same time, the article shows how, precisely as a philosopher steeped in Enlightenment thought, Ratzinger criticizes its premises from a conservative Catholic perspective. He does not point out the failures of the Enlightenment in order to restore humanity to the preceding era; on the contrary, in the spirit of the thinking of Habermas, with which he conducts a dialogue, he seeks to correct the Enlightenment and strengthen it. He does this, he claims, by exposing the theological underpinnings of the secular views of humankind and society and their reshaping in light of Catholic doctrine and tradition. By correcting secularized concepts by means of their theological roots, Ratzinger aims to update the Enlightenment in light of Christianity and to create a secular and rational sphere based on the foundations of Catholic faith. This is the first article in Hebrew devoted to the philosophy of this multi-influential theologian.

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"הטוטליזציה של המושגים היהודיים 'גלות' ו'גאולה' היא שורש הטעות" – שיחה
Issue 52 | Summer 2020
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היבטים של הימין הקיצוני החדש
Issue 52 | Summer 2020
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