For the reasons outlined in this article by Samuel Gregg at National Review, I’ve come to really admire the now out-going Pope. It’s a great summation and it was difficult to pick an excerpt:
Unlike those who we’re inclined to think are great people today, Joseph Ratzinger won’t be hitting the global-lecture circuit, garnering appointments to yet-another meaningless U.N. commission, participating in syncretistic Parliaments of Religion, or trying to retrospectively recover his reputation by writing Clintonesque memoirs. Instead, he’ll likely live out his days in a monastery, writing, thinking, but above all praying to the One who Benedict knows will one day call him home to the Father’s house.
But, like another Benedict who spent most of his life in a monastery but nevertheless managed to save Western civilization, Joseph Ratzinger knows that, in the long run, there’s something else that the world needs besides a renewal of reason in all its fullness. And that’s sanctity: the sanctity of a Thomas More, Thérèse of Lisieux, or John Paul II which produces that vision of fearless and indestructible goodness that truly changes history.
