Jimmy Akin

Fr. Roderick Vonhögen of CATHOLIC INSIDER has just kindly e-mailed me a transcript he made of a recent broadcast of Vatican Radio dealing with the alleged remarks of then-Cardinal Ratzinger on the Harry Potter books.

The piece was an interview with Msgr. Peter Fleedwood, the Vatican official who initially made (what turn out to be) moderately pro-Potter comments when asked a question about the books at a press conference.

I’ve put the entire text of the interview in the extended body of this post (click below to read it). I should say that I don’t agree with everything Msgr. Fleedwood says (e.g., I don’t think that the Harry Potter books are any great shakes as literature), but reading his side of the story sheds interesting light on the events in question.

In particular, let me call attention to a couple of things he said. First, he mentions something that I thought was likely the case, though I didn’t want to conjecture it without evidence. Msgr. Fleedwood, though, knows the workings of Vatican offices better than I and has more of a basis to say it, so here goes:

I was sent a letter from a lady in Germany who claimed to have
written to the then-Cardinal Ratzinger, saying that she thought Harry
Potter was a bad thing. And the letter back, which I suspect was
written by an assistant of the then-Cardinal Ratzinger in his office,
the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, suggested that there
was a subtle seduction in the books. What that subtle seduction was,
was not specified, which makes me think it was a generic answer. And
she had written a book on these subjects and so the Cardinal’s
signature was at the bottom of the letter, suggesting she should send
me the book.

It wouldn’t surprise me at all if Msgr. Fleedwood were correct on this point. Folks in important positions–including those in the Vatican–often use ghostwriters, and it would not be surprising at all to learn that routine correspondence such as thank you notes like the one in question were handled by assistants and then presented for the boss’s signature.

Fr. Fleedwood continues:

She sent me the book, and I found it a very unsatisfactory book. I
don’t think she understands English humour. For example, she said: one
sign that these books are making fun of Judaism and Christianity is
that Voldemort, the wicked magician, who is the great evil power
against whom Harry Potter has to fight, is referred to often as ‘he who
must not be named’, and she takes this as an insult to the name of God
in a similar way that Adonai, which is often written as Yahweh, is the
name that should not be said in Jewish religion. Well I replied to her:
don’t you know that even within English families, men who make fun of
their relationship with women in a nice, lighthearted way say: "Oh, she
who should not be named," meaning the power in the house, their wife.
You know, I think it was meant on that kind of level.

This comment also rings true for me, and for several reasons. First, I’ve seen my share of anti-New Age books that go paranoid in finding connections between things that aren’t there. (I wish people would write more serious and sober anti-New Age books, because the paranoid ones give the whole genre a bad name.)

Second, if you read the Potter books or watch the movies, it’s clear that the people in the stories are themselves being paranoid by not saying the name "Voldemort." As Msgr. Fleedwood points out, Harry Potter has the courage to say the name of his enemy and isn’t cowed by the mere mention of the name, like the others are. Thus Rowling isn’t presenting Voldemort’s name as too sacred to mention, she’s presenting everybody but Harry as being too easily spooked. You may or may not like that literarily, but it isn’t a diss at God.

Third, I have my own experience with circumlocutions of this nature. A few years ago I was dating a woman who turned out to be from the planet Yuggoth (the only one of all the women I’ve ever dated). The experience was so surreal (the phrase "Did not know what men are for" comes to mind) that, among the circle of my friends who were aware of the experience at the time, she has become known as "She Who Is Not To Be Named."

Anyway, click below for Msgr. Fleedwood’s comments, courtesy of Fr. Roderick Vonhögen.

Continue reading “Vatican Radio On Pre-16 Potter Brouhaha”

Pope Benedict XVI, or B-16 as many have begun to affectionally call him, wrote a lot of things when he was still in his Pre-16 days as Cardinal Ratzinger.

Among them were two letters that have now surfaced in the English press and been EXPLOITED BY LIFESITENEWS to convey the impression that, in their words, "POPE BENEDICT OPPOSES HARRY POTTER NOVELS".

Now, before we go any further, let me issue THE BIG RED DISCLAIMER: I am not
a fan of the Harry Potter novels. In order to be able to comment
apologetically on the Harry Potter phenomenon, I read the first novel
and watched the first two movies. I was not at all impressed with them
as literature, and I recognize that they can have a harmful spiritual
effect on some readers, especially among the young. I also recognize
that they are not an apologia for paganism and that a reader who is
secure in his faith will not be magically turned into a neo-pagan by
reading them.

What is a Catholic to make of these letters? What weight do they have? Well, let’s look at them. Here is the complete text of two English translations as offered by LifeSite. They are written in response to Gabriele Kuby, the author of a German anti-Harry Potter book which she sent to Cardinal Ratzinger:

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger                              
Vatican City
March 7, 2003

Esteemed and dear Ms. Kuby!

Many thanks for your kind letter of February 20th and the
informative book which you sent me in the same mail.  It is good, that
you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle
seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity
in the soul, before it can grow properly.

I would like to suggest that you write to Mr. Peter Fleedwood,
(Pontifical Council of Culture, Piazza S. Calisto 16, I00153 Rome)
directly and to send him your book.

Sincere Greetings and Blessings,

+ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger 

=======================

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
Vatican City
May 27, 2003

Esteemed and dear Ms. Kuby,

Somehow your letter got buried in the large pile of name-day , birthday
and Easter mail.  Finally this pile is taken care of, so that I can
gladly allow you to refer to my judgment about Harry Potter.

Sincere Greetings and Blessings,

+ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

As you can see, the bodies of these letters are a grand total of five sentences long, only three of which have to do with the Harry Potter novels. The first is basically a thank you note for her book and the second allows her to refer to what he said in the first note.

The only thing that the cardinal said in regard to the Potter novels themselves was:

It is good, that
you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle
seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity
in the soul, before it can grow properly.

You’ll note that there is a grammatical mistake in this sentence. We have a noun-pronoun agreement problem, because the apparent subject of "those" is "Harry Potter," but "Harry Potter" is singular, not plural as the word "those" would suggest. Although the German originals have been scanned and placed online (HERE and HERE–WARNING! Evil file format! [.pdf]), I don’t know German and can’t tell if the problem is there in the original. If it is, it suggests that the letter was dashed off hastily and is not the product of extensive reflection. If it isn’t then the translation is problematic and I don’t know what weight can be put on the details of wording in it. Either way, it’s reason for caution.

Another reason for caution is that there is no way to tell from this whether Cardinal Ratzinger had even read a Harry Potter novel. He may have skimmed Mrs. Kuby book (he refers to it as "informative"), he may have heard things about Harry Potter from others, but there is no indication that he has ever cracked the cover of one of the novels, much less read it from cover to cover so as to get an impression of the whole and how it might affect people.

As a result, we have no way of knowing that this is anything more than a comment made as part of a polite thank you note and expressing a general impression of the subject based on second-hand information. There is no indication that the Cardinal had any significant first-hand knowledge of Harry Potter.

This also fails to go beyond the status of a personal opinion expressed in personal (not professional) correspondence. It thus has no binding force for Catholics.

Also, note what the Cardinal didn’t say:

1. He didn’t say that nobody can read Harry Potter.
2. He didn’t say that people who are secure in their faith can’t read it.
3. He didn’t say that young people of any particular age can’t read it if their parents read it with them to help them understand problematic bits.

Now, what about the statement in the second note that

I can
gladly allow you to refer to my judgment about Harry Potter.

LifeSiteNews made a lot out of the word judgment, even putting it in quotes for emphasis (and simultaneously misspelling it as "judgement"). This word serves their purposes well as it conveys an official impression (i.e., the Cardinal has issued a "judgment"!). But the word is notoriously problematic when translating across languages. Many languages have terms that can be rendered either "judgment" or "opinion" when translated into English. Here the latter may be preferable, as the Cardinal manifestly was not making a formal judgment on the matter. He was clearly expressing a personal opinon, as is evident from the fact that this was personal rather than official correspondence.

Also, we are missing an important fact: We don’t know the exact question that Mrs. Kuby asked him to prompt this response.

In his previous note he had suggested she send a copy of her book to Fr. Peter Fleedwood. One wishing to see in this a slap at pro-Potter forces might suppose that the Cardinal wanted one sent to Fr. Fleedwood to set him straight on the Potter matter, but it may mean no more than that he’s the Vatican’s guy who’s keeping tabs on the Potter phenomenon and Cardinal Ratzinger didn’t want him to be unaware of a new book dealing with the Potter phenomenon. There might even be in this a recognition that Fleedwood is the real "expert" on the Potter phenomenon and that Ratzinger hasn’t paid a great deal of attention to it. Since the Cardinal doesn’t say why he suggested that Fr. Fleedwood be sent a copy, we can only guess.

I mention the Fleedwood situation in particular because Mrs. Kuby may have simply asked the Cardinal something like "May I mention to Fr. Fleedwood the opinion you expressed in your previous note about Harry Potter?" If that’s the case then it casts a significantly different light on his giving her permission to refer to his opinion than the one conveyed in the LifeSite story.

In any event, the Cardinal–still over two years away from when he would (to his consternation) be elected pope–most certainly did not intend his permission to mean "Should I ever be elected pope, I would be very pleased to have you use what I said in my thank you note to create an international media frenzy that causes many people to believe that the pope has officially condemned Harry Potter."

Yet that’s exactly what LifeSite has done. Millions of people will see the headline "Pope Opposes Harry Potter" or "Pope Criticizes Harry Potter" or some variant and never read the story or they will read it but lack the skill at parsing such stories to see how misleadingly the matter is being framed. Millions of people scan the Drudge Report alone every day and read its headlines (like the one on this story) without ever clicking them. Their impression of many of its news stories is formed entirely by the headlines.

Some of the people seeing the LifeSite-inspired headlines on this subject will be non-Catholic fans of Harry Potter, and in their estimation the Catholic Church will have the Church’s credibility lowered one more notch.

Thanks, LifeSite.

"It is written, ‘The name of  God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you’" (Romans 2:24).

LifeSiteNews.Com, best known for reporting pro-life issues, has just performed a disservice to both the Catholic community and the newsreading community in general.

At the heart of this disservice is THIS STORY ON THEIR WEB SITE.

Here’s are a couple of important excerpts whose significance I’ll elaborate on:

[In February 2003] the English press throughout the world falsely proclaimed that Pope John Paul II approved of Harry Potter. . . .

[A] Vatican prelate who quipped about Potter during a press briefing . . . led to the false press about the Vatican support of Potter.  At a Vatican press conference to present a study document on the New Age in April 2003, one of the presenters – Fr. Peter Fleedwood – made a positive comment on the Harry Potter books in response to a question from a reporter.    Headlines such as "Pope Approves Potter" (Toronto Star), "Pope Sticks Up for Potter Books" (BBC), "Harry Potter Is Ok With The Pontiff" (Chicago Sun Times) and "Vatican: Harry Potter’s OK with us" (CNN Asia) littered the mainstream media.

I remember this event. I gnashed my teeth during it at the stupidity of the press. The fact is, most reporters and editors are so UTTERLY CLUELESS about how the Church works that they can take some offhanded comment by a priest in a press conference and report it as an official declaration by the pope. What a bunch of individuals too ignorant to hold their own jobs!

LifeSiteNews.Com obviously was upset about it, too, as the two extracts from their current (2005) story illustrate.

But y’know what?

I also resent it when a group that is aware of this tendency of the press decides to EXPLOIT it and PLAYS THEM FOR SUCKERS.

That’s exactly what LifeSite has done.

Specifically: They have taken two brief instances of a person who was not the pope but who works at the Vatican and was speaking in a private capacity and presented them to the press in a way that they either knew or should have reasonably foreseen as causing the press to misrepresent these as official papal statements.

Thus one of the headlines on the Drudge Report was

POPE CRITICIZES HARRY POTTER . . .

But it doesn’t stop with secular sites getting the headline wrong. LifeSite ITSELF is running a story with the gravely misleading headline

POPE BENEDICT OPPOSES HARRY POTTER NOVELS

Now, before we go any further, let me issue THE BIG RED DISCLAIMER: I am not a fan of the Harry Potter novels. In order to be able to comment apologetically on the Harry Potter phenomenon, I read the first novel and watched the first two movies. I was not at all impressed with them as literature, and I recognize that they can have a harmful spiritual effect on some readers, especially among the young. I also recognize that they are not an apologia for paganism and that a reader who is secure in his faith will not be magically turned into a neo-pagan by reading them.

Having said that, what’s problematic about LifeSite’s headline–and its story in general?

Let us count the ways . . .

1. As anybody in the news business should know (like the people at LifeSiteNews), the headline of a story is crucial. It can’t misrepresent the content of the story or the facts behind it. Yet that is precisely what this headline does.
2. The headline is all the more crucial in the news business because it frames the way folks read the story and because many people read the headline who never go on to read the story. The only impression they have of it is the one generated by the headline.
3. To any reader of normal intelligence the above headline would convey the impression that Pope Benedict has said something official that is in opposition to the Harry Potter novels. Individuals reading news stories commonly assume that when the pope is reported as doing something that he has just done it (hence: "news") and that he has done it in an official capacity (hence: "pope").
4. In this case, Pope Benedict has said absolutely nothing about Harry Potter.
5. What the stories is based on is a pair of extremely short letters written by Cardinal Ratzinger. We therefore have a problem with LifeSite misrepresenting, in its headline, comments by a cardinal as comments by the pope. The fact that this cardinal later became pope is irrelevant. Cardinals have a liberty to say things that popes do not, and you cannot go rummaging around in things a cardinal said years before becoming pope and represent them in a fashion that will lead the casual reader to suppose that they are things that he has endorsed as pope.
6. Further, the two letters were not from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. They were private correspondence from Cardinal Ratzinger. We therefore have a problem, again on the headline level, with representing personal opinion in a way that would lead the reader to think of it as official.
7. Further, the two letters were written more than two years ago. We therefore have a problem with representing old material as if it were new. Note the tenses in the headline: "Pope Benedict opposes [present tense] Harry Potter." Uh-uh. Cardinal Ratzinger two years ago said things that sounded anti-Potter, but people can, y’know, change their minds on subjects, particularly as they learn more about them. You can’t take a statement someone made two years ago and represent it as indicative of present opposition when, in fact, there has been NO present opposition.

Even granting that their interpretation of Cardinal Ratzinger’s remarks was accurate (a point I will deal with later), what we have here is a case of LifeSiteNews taking (1) an unofficial statement (2) of personal opinion (3) by a man who worked at the Vatican and portraying it in a way (including, in this case, headlines on their own web site) in which (4) a casual reader would conclude that it was an official statement of the pope.

SAME EXACT THING THEY FAULTED THE WORLD MEDIA FOR DOING BACK IN 2003.

Colloquially, that’s referred to as the pot calling the kettle black.

Technically, that’s referred to as hypocrisy.

Only this time, what happened can’t be chalked up simply to the cluelessness of the world media. LifeSiteNews exploited that cluelessness. They played the press for suckers in order to generate the kind of press coverage they wanted. That’s a special kind of hypocrisy.

Now, having said all this, what should the faithful make of the contents of the two private Ratzinger letters?

See my forthcoming post on that subject.