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A Year After Benedict

Today’s the anniversary of Benedict XVI’s resignation announcement. I will down a Jager in honor of the occasion, even though we still don’t fully know why he did what he did. Mathew Schmalz credits the pope emeritus with paving the way for his successor’s humility:

It’s easy to see how Pope Francis’s simplicity stands in stark contrast and how this would be a welcome change for some. And Francis has emphasized different themes — the church is more of a community and less of a hierarchical institution; Jesus is less of a priest and more of an itinerant preacher close to the poor.

But Benedict XVI did one thing that allowed everything new that we’ve seen from Pope Francis: he resigned the papacy. Benedict believed the papacy, “the Petrine ministry,” was important, but that he himself was dispensable: when the time came, Benedict had no problem letting go. As he promised, Benedict XVI has remained quiet and out of public view. Benedict’s acts of humility, more than anything else, have given Francis the opportunity to be pope in a new kind of way.

But Marcus O’Donnell points out that Francis still has Benedict’s decades of reactionary appointments to overcome:

The main factor mitigating against change in the church is that nearly all its current Bishops were appointed during the reigns of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, who, between them, had 35 years to install like-minded conservative leaders throughout the church. Virtually no progressive leaders from the Vatican II reform generation remain. While there are still small pockets of progressive resistance it has been hard to sustain against an active Vatican campaign to stamp out dissent.

And Dennis Coday reminds readers of the chaotic state in which he left the church:

Remember what we, in the U.S. Catholic church, had been through: an “apostolic visitation” of congregations of American women religious; a doctrinal investigation of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious and the appointment of overlords to help them “reform.” Maryknoll Fr. Roy Bourgeois had been excommunicated because he supported women’s ordination. Long established and trusted scholars, Mercy Sr. Margaret Farley and St. Joseph Sr. Elizabeth Johnson, had been censured. The chairman of the U.S. bishops’ National Review Board for child protection had warned the bishops that complacency threatened the continuing implementation of their policies and guidelines meant to keep children safe. The U.S. bishops seemed to be doing their best to scuttle health care reform over — of all things — artificial contraception; their campaign for religious freedom seemed petty and partisan. A clunky, ideologically driven translation of the Mass prayers had been thrust upon us.

In an interview with Reuters, Archbishop Georg Gänswein says Benedict’s conscience is clear:

Pope Benedict is at peace with himself  and I think he is even at peace with the Lord. He is well but certainly he is a person who carries the weight of his years. So, he is a man who is physically old but his spirit is very vivacious and very clear. … I am certain, indeed convinced, that history will offer a judgment that will be different than what one often read in the last years of his pontificate because the sources are clear and clarity springs from them.

Rocco Palmo reports on what Benedict has been up to in the past year:

Since stepping away, the now Pope-emeritus has broadly held to his plan for his retirement to be spent “hidden from the world.” From his base in the former Mater Ecclesiae convent in the Vatican Gardens, Benedict – who’ll be 87 in April – is said to spend his days with the books he once called his “old friends,” still engaged in theological study, though he’s not expected to write again. A midday walk in the Vatican Gardens is often followed by time at the piano. Company does come, but the invitations tend to be limited to a relatively tight circle of longtime allies, who can be sufficiently trusted to not leak what he says.

The mail is another story, however. A lengthy letter Benedict wrote an atheist author last November was published in La Repubblica with his consent, and in yesterday’s edition of the leftist daily, it emerged that Ratzinger had resumed correspondence with Hans Kung, his colleague-turned-rival of half a century, who he famously hosted for dinner months after his election.

(Photo: By Stefan Wermuth/WPA Pool/Getty Images)

Keep Calm And Paddle On

The UK is experiencing its “most exceptional period of rainfall in 248 years”, causing widespread flooding in southwest England and the Thames Valley:

After his most recent tour of the destruction caused by the relentless rains in Somerset, Prime Minister David Cameron referred to the flooded devastation as “biblical.” While experts warn that the insurance industry could be facing a bill of £500m from the winter flooding, farmers and environmental groups have been raising concerns about the consequences that the flooding will have on the nation’s food security.

Cameron is catching heat:

Scientists are blasting the government for failing to heed warnings that climate change and poorly controlled development in low-lying areas was heightening the risk of catastrophic floods. Richard Ashley of Sheffield University, author of a 2004 government-commissioned report on flood risks, says the government’s “obsession with deregulation” and budget-cutting had exacerbated the problem. In an interview with the Independent newspaper, he blamed “short-term politicians who don’t take notice of the science.”

Indeed, the science looks sobering. Ashley’s 2004 report predicted that winter rainfall in Britain could increase by as much as 15 percent by 2050 because of climate change. After extreme flooding in 2007, the government commissioned an update based on newer, more advanced climate-change modeling. The new study predicted that winter precipitation could rise by as much as 25 percent by 2050.

(Photo: Residents use a boat make their way through floodwater that has cut off their homes in Chertsey, United Kingdom on February 11, 2014. The Environment Agency contiues to issue severe flood warnings for a number of areas on the river Thames in the commuter belt west of London. With heavier rains forecast for the coming week people are preparing for for the water levels to rise. By Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Speaking Out About Suicide

Cara Anna, inspired by the Ted talk seen above, hopes more suicide-attempt survivors “come out” about their experiences:

For me, not being able to see anyone like myself talking about feeling suicidal only made me feel more suicidal, because it was easy to tell myself that I was a loser. What if we were encouraged to come out? What if there were a national campaign that built on JD’s speech, featuring the lawyers among us, the doctors, the artists, the tech workers, the grad students, the people who know so well the enormous effort of gritting their teeth and saying to colleagues and the world, “I feel fine?” …

I started Talking About Suicide with the goal of putting all the resources I could find, like JD’s video, in one place. It began with the nervous interview of another “out” attempt survivor, and it now features more than 50 conversations. Everyone has been direct and fascinating. Only once, briefly, has someone cried. The American Association of Suicidology took notice, and Attempt Survivors launched a year ago with essays, videos and resources.

I love that people are finding they’re not alone. It’s a relief for them, and it’s been a relief for me.

Previous Dish on suicide here, here, here, here, and here.  The thread “Suicide Leaves Behind Nothing” is here.

Forget The Whiskey And Drugs

Riffing on the life and work of Ingmar Bergman, Dorth Nors argues that great artists need solitude most of all:

Solitude, I think, heightens artistic receptivity in a way that can be challenging and painful. When you sit there, alone and working, you get thrown back on yourself. Your life and your emotions, what you think and what you feel, are constantly being thrown back on you. And then the “too much humanity” feeling is even stronger: you can’t run away from yourself. You can’t run away from your emotions and your memory and the material you’re working on. Artistic solitude is a decision to turn and face these feelings, to sit with them for long periods of time.

It takes the courage to be there. You run into your own pettiness. Your own cowardice. You run into all kinds of ugly sides of yourself. But the things that you’ve experienced in your life become the writing that you do. And there’s no easy way to get to it, if you want to write literary fiction. And that’s what Bergman and other Swedish writers have taught me—to stay in that painful zone, discipline myself through it to get where I want.

Scotland vs Britain, Round II

Massie thinks that September’s referendum on Scottish independence might pass:

Real Scots vote ‘yes’; timid Scots vote ‘no’ — and doubtless, in time, will fill a coward’s grave. This might seem a form of emotional blackmail, but it is a mightily effective one…

At the same time, Salmond argues that very little will change. The nationalist campaign might be subtitled ‘Project Reassurance’. Nevertheless, despite presenting his case as a question of fiscal accountancy and common sense, the true appeal of independence is still emotional. What kind of country, Salmond and his colleagues will ask, rejects the chance to govern itself? It is a good question. The answer, of course, is a country that rejects as false the choice between two identities. You can be a Highlander, Scottish and British — just as you can be Cornish, English and British. Even so, Salmond articulates a vision of a better, purely Scottish future in ways that no unionist politician has yet matched.

I saw the inexorable logic of this as far back as 1999:

Blair has allowed the Scottish Parliament the leeway to lower or raise the British rate of income tax by only 3 percentage points. But the direction is clear enough. Blair clearly believed that by devolving some power to Scotland he would defuse the independence movement. Instead, the opposite could happen. The latest polls suggest that in the new Edinburgh Parliament the largest single party may well be the Scottish Nationalists, who see the new Parliament as a way station to full independence. Of the dozens of conversations I had in London about the future of the United Kingdom, literally no one I spoke with believed that Scotland would be a part of Britain in 10 years’ time.

And since then, as Alex notes, the momentum has been pretty steady and, with a few setbacks, in a pretty clear direction. You see the impact of this in England too, where the flag of Saint George is far more popular now than the old Union Jack. And when Scotland competes in international rugby, it takes part in the Six Nations Cup – those six nations being England, France, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Italy.

Party politics has only made the Unionist case less potent:

The Tories, bashful as ever, are reluctant to campaign vigorously for the Union lest their unpopularity in Scotland weaken the overall case for unionism. Labour are reluctant to be seen within spitting distance of any Tory. Moreover, the unionist alliance allows the SNP to argue that there is no functional difference between the Labour and Conservative parties. Only the SNP will stand up for Scotland’s interests by putting Scotland first.

Larison likewise argues that opponents of independence are defeating their own cause:

[I]f the unionists mainly rely on painting a gloomy picture of what post-independence Scotland will be like, enough people may conclude that there is no positive unionist case to be made and will decide to vote for the referendum whose advocates at least pretend to have a clear idea of where they want to take their country. I still doubt that Scotland will vote for independence in the end, but it is a lot more likely than it was just a few months ago.

Yglesias declares himself ”favorably disposed” to Scottish independence:

The main reason is that it seems to me that in the European context where everyone is a stable democracy with a mixed-market economy, the small countries (Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, etc.) are generally a lot better run than the bigger ones. For one thing, smaller countries have simpler institutional arrangements since you’re not trying to accommodate size by embedding complicated federalism mechanisms into the already complicated framework of the European Union. But for another thing, I think the debate over welfare state design gets more sensible when you’re talking about a small jurisdiction. A place like Scotland is a sufficiently small share of the United Kingdom that it makes sense for a Scottish political activist to be more focused on “how much money does this program bring to Scotland?” than on “how good is this program at generating social benefits in a cost-effective way?” An independent Scotland—like an independent Wallonia or other possible new European mini-states—would have politics that I think would ultimately be more constructive.

(Painting: The Battle of Culloden (1746) by David Morier, oil on canvas. It was the last real battle between the forces of the Crown and Scottish insurgents.)

Face Of The Day

Pascal Tessier receives his Eagle scout badge at his weekly troop meeting, at the All Saints Church in Chevy Chase. Tessier will be one of the first openly gay Eagle scouts. In the past he would have been asked to leave or be booted from scouting, but BSA ruled that it would accept gay scouts but not gay scout leaders. By Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post via Getty Images.

Clinton’s Achilles Heels, Ctd

Masket doubts that Hillary’s thin record will prevent her from winning the White House:

As Barack Obama demonstrated, a lack of legislative accomplishments will prevent you neither from becoming president nor from accruing impressive legislative accomplishments once you’re there. And voters don’t really care much about rationale, probably aware that every presidential candidate’s true rationale is, “I’d like to be president and I think I’d do a pretty good job.” These are mainly issues that political journalists stew over, and not without cause! Writing about the same person in the same way for a quarter century is extremely tedious, particularly when that person is sitting on a large lead and her strategy is to say as few risky things as possible.

But voters, we know from a long line of research (PDF), don’t really focus on these things when deciding on their next president.

Their main concerns are the status of the economy, the presence or absence of war, and the perceived moderation of the candidates. If the economy is growing reasonably well in 2016, if we are not engaged in a massive bloody war, and if Clinton is not perceived as excessively ideological (relative to her Republican opponent), she’ll have a very good shot of winning the general election. A recession that year would likely doom her or any other Democratic presidential candidate.

Nevertheless, PM Carpenter is dreading the Clinton campaign:

The other day someone chastised me on this site for being ignorantly unenthused by another Clinton candidacy, since the alternative could only be–egads–a Republican president. On that point, I’m in full accord with the chastiser. Anyone is preferable to a Huckabee or a Paul or God forbid another Bush. To my mind, that goes without saying. But I guess, duly criticized, I should be saying that a lot, as we proceed to the presidential sweepstakes: Hillary is better than the ghastly alternatives.

That’s quite the rallying cry.

Heh.

What If The Russian Economy Runs Out Of Gas?

In the Dish’s latest podcast, Masha Gessen discusses how Putin’s control of the media prevents accurate polling on his popularity. But Daniel Treisman finds that “Putin’s popularity remains highly vulnerable to a further deterioration in the economy”:

Russia’s growth rate has sunk steadily from 4.8 percent in the first quarter of 2012 to 1.2 percent in the third quarter of 2013. This has not yet affected incomes and employment in a way that would undermine public assessments of the economy. But if it does, the political effects may be pronounced.

The View From Your Window

Dhaka, Bangladesh, 12 pm

The Signs Of Mental Illness

Photographer Lisa Lindvay captures her family’s coping with her mother’s mental illness:

Lindvay’s intimate photographs of her siblings and father in their home, as they come to terms with her mother’s mental illness, challenge our notion of domestic bliss. The house is a mess—overrun by soda bottles, pizza boxes, computer wires, and detritus lodged in the carpet—and each family member seems to be suspended in their own private world. …

The images are unsparing, but never unkind. The house itself feels neglected, but at the same time it is clearly a comfort to the family, a place where they can be both vulnerable and free. Though things are coming apart there, the home could very well be the structure that holds them together.

Jenna Garrett passes along more images from the series:

Though Lindvay’s mother is absent, the signs of her struggle are present in every frame, each image heavy with abandon and quiet exhaustion. Here we are privy to the deeply private tale of her father and sibling’s lives behind the closed and musty blinds, the grimy floors and junk food artifacts a constant reminder of what is broken and missing.

(Photo by Lisa Lindvay)