An Open Letter to Cardinal Ratzinger

January 28, 2022
Feast of Saint Thomas Aquinas

 Dear Cardinal Ratzinger,

Secular, humanist and human rights groups gathered to protest the state visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the United Kingdom, 2010. Photo by Jason on Flickr.

You have been in the news lately, and it has not been good news either for you or for the many victims who have been reminded of the suffering they are dealing with at the hands of the church over the past decades. 

I write this letter because I am concerned about you as you face your last years and some unpleasant truths are coming out about your protecting pedophile priests who wrecked great harm on innocent children while you were archbishop in Munich.  And about your lying to a commission about having been at an important meeting when a priest who ended up accosting 23 boys was discussed.

You may remember me, as I was one of the 108 theologians that you denounced in your time as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (formerly known as the Office of the Holy Inquisition).  My name is Matthew Fox and you saw to it that I was expelled from my Dominican Order after 34 years of trying, however imperfectly, to live its lofty motto, “Truth.” 

Since my expulsion I have been received into the Episcopal Church which has allowed me to continue my vocation as a theologian and to celebrate now over 110 “Cosmic Masses” by which we have brought post-modern art forms including rave, dj, vj, rap, and of course dance, to our tired liturgies of the West.  For this I am grateful to them and to you also for expelling me and thus putting me on a more liberated and creative path to continue my theological and priestly vocation especially with the young.

I am pleased to learn that you have apologized publicly for not telling the truth regarding the grave matter of priestly pedophilia in your diocese of Munich.  This offers hope that before your life ends you might apologize to many whom you have offended in your powerful positions at CDF and as pope.  A time of confession and release seems close at hand for you and I seek to bless you on your journey. 

I think it would be wise to apologize to the church as a whole for your spreading fear of theologians—and therefore of thinking—upon the household of the church.  Condemning thinkers or theologians is one reason the church is so wobbly at this time and so many people have left it, especially young people who find the hypocrisy unbearable and who grew up with the news of clerical abuse of children their own ages that was rampant.  Just one example is that of Cardinal Law in Boston here in the United States who, not unlike you, approved of sending a priest who abused 150 boys from parish to parish and even diocese to diocese and whom you rewarded or ‘elevated’ to be overseer of the 4th century basilica of Maria Maggiore in Rome and thus escaped testimony under oath in the courts of Massachusetts.  (I pounded my 95 theses for reforming the church at that basilica for that very reason; just as I pounded them at Wittenberg at the season of Pentecost the year you became pope.)

There is also the horrible case of Father Maciel that you knew about for years and let languish on your desk at CDF who abused many seminarians in his Order and who, as it turned out, was also married twice on the side and sexually abused his own children and was a drug addict.  And about whom you refused to act for years, saying that he “does so much good for the church,” meaning I guess, that he raised more money from the uber wealthy than anyone else in the twentieth century church.

But the forgiveness you seek is not only for pedophile clergy but the reason behind it which is: Ecclesiolatry.  There is such a thing as making an idol of the church itself.  This is done every time a member of the hierarchy chooses to put the “reputation of the church” ahead of the rights of a human being, especially a child.  See what havoc is wrecked when one follows such idolatries.  The irony is that the church you sought to protect at all costs is wounded far more deeply by this deception than had the truth been allowed to flourish and real action had been enacted.

It is good to see you are apologizing in your advanced age.  I invite you to seek forgiveness for the following actions as well:

Calling Thich Naht Hanh, a true saint in our times, the “anti-Christ.”   He passed the very week news of you broke.  I knew him and his holy work well and he was indeed “another Christ” and “another Buddha” as we are all called to be—and which he taught.

Forbidding Catholics to practice yoga because it may put them “too much in touch with their bodies.”

Telling women they cannot be ordained because Jesus did not ordain women, knowing full well that he did not ordain men either and that the priesthood was a second century, not a first century, creation.

Condemning homosexuals viscously in two papal documents and refusing apparently to study any science (a la Galileo times) about the truth that 8-10 % of any human population is gay and that 364 other species have been identified that house homosexual populations.

Canonizing the Spanish fascist priest and founder of Opus Dei, Josemaria Escriva and rushing his canonization process through in record time while forbidding those who knew him very well from voicing their objections and witness to his very dubious character including his misogyny, control compulsions and heated vitriol against women who worked for him.

Promoting Opus Dei to an elevated status.

Appointing numerous Opus Dei hierarchy in South and North America including of course the current head of the United States bishops conference.

Killing liberation theology and base communities in South and Central America and in the process being complicit with “at least 10,000 murders there” as a priest very familiar with the South American scene told me.

Rushing through the canonization of JPII, your mentor and enabler, who was very much complicit in many of these actions named above.

Becoming a lightning rod for authoritarian and fascist figures including but not limited to Cardinal Burke, Stephen Bannon, and many bishops whom you appointed in the United States and beyond.

Putting obedience before truth and justice and compassion, thus contradicting the teachings of Jesus.

Rendering theology “dead” in Europe as a theologian at my alma mater, the Institut catholique in Paris put it to me.

Being a bully in your hierarchical positions.

Calling Creation Spirituality, which has been my life’s work and has inspired many especially those trying to save Mother Earth, “dangerous and deviant.”  It is hard not to see such language as being a projection from you.  Beware of projection and the scapegoats it makes.  I would think someone who came of age under the Nazis would be especially sensitive to that practice, so common among fascists.  I am at peace to let history determine whether CS or the truths emerging now about your acts of commission and omission have been, in your words, “dangerous and deviant.”

You embarrass yourself in many of these instances—surely in calling Thich Naht Hanh “anti-Christ.”  And your condemning of my work such as “calling God Mother” (which Hildegard, Mechtild, Eckhart, and Julian all did); calling God “child” (ever heard of Christmas?); being a “feminist theologian” (Jesus supported women—why don’t you?—St. Hildegard was a feminist); “working too closely with Native Americans”-- what does that even mean?  Native Americans have graced me with their wisdom and their profound ceremonies that honor Mother Earth and our bodily condition.  They do not pray in their heads.  I hope you can lift yourself of these embarrassments with a heart-felt apologies before you leave this earth.

Some people have proposed that a proper penance for your public sins would be to cease wearing the papal white outfit that you wear.  I think that would be a beginning but maybe an ancient church practice might follow on that: the wearing of sackcloth and ashes (not all the time but for photographs).  I think that would be humble but modest penance for the damage that has been done to many and especially the young boys who have been traumatized for life.  The ashes could be simple: what one wears on Ash Wednesday.

I had a Dominican professor in my training who used to say that “a kitten born in an oven is not a cookie.”  He was emphasizing the essence of a thing by his statement.  The public is now aware that your white robes did not tell the story of your actions and thoughts inside you.  But the revelations now made public reinforce the message that it is our insides that need cleansing, as Jesus taught.

So I pray for you and your soul in these final days of your life on earth, Joseph Ratzinger, pope emeritus.  I hope that you can continue on the path you have started out on to apologize for your faulty decisions over the years.  It is a good path,  None of us is perfect.  It is never too late to seek penance and forgiveness and time is running out for you and for the many you have offended to hear from you.  I hope you will consider my proposals in the decisions you are currently making.

Your brother,

Matthew Fox, oops (once of the order of preachers).

P.S. Thank you for canonizing Hildegard of Bingen and making her a doctor of the church.  I was blessed to teach two courses on the internet this past year on Hildegard and we had over 1200 students learning about her in the two classes.  I am sure this pleases you as it does me.

Posting 95 Theses at Cardinal Law's Basilica

Just before we started the event I asked my 30 year old woman translator if she was scared.  “No,” she said. “Even though we don’t know what is going to happen, I am looking forward to it.  It is important that we do this and what happens will happen.”  Courage!  Always a sign of the spirit. The action at Cardinal Law’s basilica was memorable for many reasons: the crowd that gathered (it was announced beforehand in the paper), their questions; their passion in taking on the policemen especially around the right to hang the theses on a gate; the beauty of the morning with sun shining from an all-blue sky; the length of time we stayed there—about 80 minutes (much larger gathering than Wittenberg);  the Vatican plainclothes police with dark sun glasses staring at me the whole time; and above all the strategy and courage of the young people who created the excellent poster which looked like a medieval Manuscript in a large type that yet was practical and easy to read; their flexibility in adapting to the policemen’s tactics, for example they smartly engaged the moment and the Vatican plain clothed police when the crowd had dispersed.  I was away from this engagement but saw dramatic interaction from where I was.  I so look forward to seeing their film.  I especially wonder if Stephano the filmer got the attack by the Vatican thugs of the second film maker on film?

How right Barbara was about 1) Vatican police dictating orders to Roman police and 2) the thugs that are policing the Vatican these days. Just as I learned after my Wittenberg action how much darker the Vatican was than I had anticipated, so with this Italian, Roman, action, I learned how much darker still were the forces and veritable police state ruling not only Vatican City but, in many respects, Rome itself.  Penny Lernoux’ words are chilling: “Ratzinger is only a front man for the German-Polish mafia,” she said.  Or Barbara’s words: “The Vatican is run by a gang of mafia thugs.”

Our protest was non-violent and remained that way in the face of violence on the part of the Vatican police.  Are Italians forbidden to preach or to listen to a preacher in a public square?  Was the Basilica event an historic moment?  One of empowerment for Italians vis a vis the church?  Consider that Italy never underwent the Protestant Reformation (but only the counter-Reformation of the Council of Trent).

Our videographers and photographers were taking pictures of the police videographers and photographers and vice versa.  It was like a scene from old East Germany.  The Stasi.  That was the feeling emanating from the Vatican police.

Before we began, one of our people went into the church to scout things out.  Many policemen were inside.  He went up to one and said, “I heard there was going to be a demonstration here today,” (or something close to that) and the policeman got very agitated and said: “No there won’t be.  We will see to that.”  So that was our first clue that our demonstration would be outdoors and even outside the fence.  But as it happened, even that distance was not enough to satisfy the Vatican police (who apparently have very broad jurisdiction in Rome itself).  During the course of my presentation and the q and a period of about 80 minutes, the sheet containing the theses were taken down (I took them back at one point from the policeman who took them down), put up again, taken down, held up by some of the participants standing by, etc. etc.  Up-down, Up down, Up-down.

A man who asked some very sophisticated questions about my presentation (he had the air of a lawyer about him and was of mature age), ended up in a shouting match with the policeman who was literally receiving phone calls from higher ups on his ear phone telling him what to do.  From the pained look on his face I had the distinct impression that he wished he was elsewhere—like rescuing a cat stranded in a tree or even a spouse form domestic abuse or handing out traffic violations—just anywhere other than in a church courtyard on a Sunday morning being dictated to by plainclothes police with their phones in their ear and hearing a presenter calling for a religious reformation (or revolution?).  The shouting match between the police and this “lawyer” person was about 1) who owned the property we stood on and 2) Who owned the fence demarcating this property from the church steps and on which we hung the theses.  The “lawyer” said in an angry voice to the policeman, “my taxes paid for this sidewalk and fence so keep your hands off the preacher’s theses.”  There was considerable back and forth.

Meanwhile, “radio radicale” was there the entire time with a microphone in my and the translator’s face and with a number of questions posed as soon as I finished my presentation.  My presentation followed my 4 points I laid out in my “New Reformation” book—how our day paralleled Luther’s day in four respects: 1) invention of printing press/invention of electronic media 2) politics as rise of nationalism/politics as globalization and sparks of democracy 3) rise of humanist scholarship of which Luther was a part/rise of scientific and theological scholarship of our time and 4) corruption in the highest places of the church/corruption in the highest places of the church including Cardinal Law overseeing this particular cathedral, he who passed one priest from parish to parish who abused 150 boys and who now sits on a commission in the Vatican appointing bishops around the world!  A woman professor told me she took a 3 hours train ride to be present for the event.  She taught anthropology and religion and invited me to come to her university to lecture—they would pay for my trip to Italy she said.

Before we began, one man came up to me who was about 44 years old and said: “I no longer call myself a Catholic but simply a Christian.”

All the while the young members of our team were alert and smiling and doing their assigned tasks whether taking video, guarding the theses, mixing with the group, translating, photographing the cops, hanging around me for protection.  (They had arranged all that beforehand among themselves with no coaching from me.)  They did it with smiles on their faces. They gathered with the plainclothes Vatican cops when the event had finished and argued vociferously about their demands to see their papers and my documents as well.  “We have done no crime so you have no right to demand our papers,” they declared.  But maybe they had committed a crime.  The crime of inviting people on church soil to think.

Their final act was to keep the thug Vatican cops demanding my papers engaged while one of their group quietly slipped away, came rapidly up to me and said “walk away fast” to the taxi stand at the side of the church.  Drama.  A day of drama.  Working with the young people was marvelous.  They were alert, flexible, prepared, strong, smiling, committed, competent, brave.  Intergenerational wisdom indeed!  Intergenerational courage also.

A number of people requested copies of the theses to read and study.  We told them that they would be posted in the Italian version on the Fazi web page.  Among phrases I heard from thoughtful Italians in conversation during my visit: “The church is dead.”  “We are a culture today with no new ideas. Old people are running things in a very old way.”  “Unemployment among the young is at 24%.  Many are being supported by their grandparents and parents even after college graduation sincere there are no jobs to be had.”  “A growing tension between the young and old.”  “Old money is running everything. “ People are scared with the bad economy.  The women’s movement is very weak.  “We are a conservative country.  Even liberal minded people have trouble imagining women priests.”  You can get a college degree for just $2000 per year but there are no jobs after school.  “The one thing Italy gives the world consistently is…Beauty.  That is our only gift to the world.”

I ask myself: Why are the Italians seemingly so keen on my work at this time?  One reason is the timing.  There is a lot of anger among Catholics and it is clear that first a Polish papacy and then a German papacy have not always sat well with Italians.  Another is that there is no love lost for Ratzinger himself.  In my time there and even near St Peter’s I did not see one poster for sale of Pope Ratzinger.  Another is that Aquinas with his non-dualistic philosophy is SO Italian in spirit in so many ways and the Augustinian mind-sets of the two recent popes is not at all of the Aquinas mind-set.  Furthermore, we need to remind ourselves that the Protestant Reformation did not penetrate Italy; it affected it by way of the counter-reformation but that did not question the powers of the papacy.  My 95 theses do put deeper questions.  Is calling for a Reformation in the church today rousing a sleeping giant in Italy?  The Italian capacity for real spirituality in the creation spiritual tradition is vast.  Is the Roman Catholic church, together with the media, not perfectly set up for non-violent resistance? For church-step sit ins?  For filling the jails?  For exposing the darkness of the Vatican and its ways at this time in history?

All in all, it was a most amazing trip—perhaps the most amazing gig in my life.  The people I met from the publishing house, Vito and our public dialog at the amazing conference of writers, his passion and radical critical mind, the many serious and passionate and intellectually-solid interviews on radio, in magazines and newspapers, and the amazing TV program.  The filming and event at Law’s Basilica.  Much to remember and to build on.

The abuse at the hands of church has been going on for so many centuries—buttressed by an ideology of suffering and penance and sin, that I had no idea what Romans have suffered at in the hands of the Roman Catholic church.  This is one reason a number of commentators called “original blessing” a “Copernican revolution” for a religion based on punitive images of God and a consciousness of sin. A difficult thing to do, to change it. I recall a Native American woman who was also a Catholic returning from a ceremony at the Vatican to beatify Blessed Tekawitha: “There are evil spirits in that place, (i.e. the Vatican)” she recalled.

I think most Catholics today—Italy, Ireland, United States, Latin America and parts in between—are in a complete state of disgust.  This morning’s Boston Globe quotes some Catholics in Ireland.  One says: “When we were growing up, you believed in the church more so than you believed in God….Now the whole thing is transformed.  You believe in God but you don’t believe in the church.”  And a priest, Fr. Tony Cullen, says: “I’d like to see the clerical church die, and the proper church emerge, the church of the people.”  What to do?  How create new structures?  Stay and fight?  Abandon it altogether?  Fight from the outside?  All of the above?  One thing is certain: The clerical church is dying.