Habemas papam!

The real joy on the faces of the Catholics in St. Peter's Square when the election of Pope Benedict XVI was announced puts the lie to the shallow and insincere pronouncements by the Western media about what the Church supposedly needed to do at this juncture in history. They say Catholics needed a progressive Pope, a Pope who would reach out to the disaffected modern Catholics of Western Europe and North America and "bring the Church into the 21st Century." Catholics needed what they have always needed -- a true priest to interpret and preach the Gospel for all time, not just for this time. The talking heads of the media called Cardinal Ratzinger a "dogmatist," as if that was a bad thing. But a church without dogma is not a church at all. They called him a "conservative," as if the whole point of tracing a creed back to St. Peter isn't precisely to conserve the immediacy of what Christ taught his disciples. They call him "staunch," as if bending to the winds of change is a virtue. They just don't get it. The polls of American "Catholics" -- how many of those polled see the inside of a Church more than once a year? how many put any significant money in the plate? how many of them know what is in the Catechism? how many of them say Hail Marys with their children? -- are exercises in mootness. The Church doesn't take polls. Real Catholics have true joy tonight. Habemas papam! We have a Pope!

The Church will be here when CNN is the answer to a trivia question.