Toronto press assess Benedict's first year.

Toronto -- The tone of the Globe and Mail's contribution was set by a striking full-page and full-colour photo of the back of Benedict XVI, crimson-robed from collar to hem, exiting a youth meeting, with the title written in white across the crimson robe: "The pope nobody knows." What could possibly be the symbolism of all that? No doubt the editors considered themselves very clever; any thinking person must rate it as not merely heavy-handed, but as painfully obvious.

Michael Valpy, an agnostic, is the Globe's religion writer. He followed up the Dracula-style photograph (April 15, 2006) with what was meant to be an insightful two-page spread on the first year of the new papacy. He resorted for guidance to professional Catholic dissenter Hans Kung, the Swiss theologian demoted in 1979, who believes he understands everything about the Church when, in fact, his 40-year hostility towards the Church's doctrines has blinded him to her true role.

Valpy's main message: the Polish pope was not as highly esteemed by curial types in the Vatican as by the general unwashed public. As for the German pope, we'll have to wait and see. Patience will obviously be required as Benedict is surrounded by "people who know how to keep their mouths shut." Mr. Valpy padded out his piece with some entertaining tidbits on pope-based commercial ventures in the Pontiff's Bavarian hometown.

Perhaps we were spared in that Mr. Valpy did not dissertate on the Good Friday ceremony. The Toronto Star (April 15, 2006) produced a well-detailed account of this, accompanied by two impressive photos, under the heading "Pope's message bleak, blunt." The text concentrated on the message's condemnation of the "decadent narcissism" which promotes the spread of evil in the world, and of genetic research which attempts "to modify the very grammar of life as planned and willed by God." A couple of Catholic theology professors were quoted saying, "It is very strong language" and "there's a lot of disagreement about this stuff." (They were right. Toronto's homosexualist newspaper Xtra quoted it under the title, "In case you forgot where he stands" [April 27].)

On Easter day the Star printed a long philosophical essay, "Jesus versus the gods of science" by (Father) Pier Giorgio di Cicco, Toronto's poet laureate, in which he argued that in modern culture the true Jesus is sacrificed on the altar of scientific political correctness.

The National Post weighed in with a headline about the Pope's "dark vision of (the) world." Author Joseph Brean's piece--like the Toronto Star's--focused on the Pope's condemnation of current culture in general and genetic manipulation in particular. Felicitously, he was set to rights by a young teacher who said of her students, that they knew, "as Jesus said, you're either with me or ... against me."

The Post also carried the thoughtful and positive columns of Fr. Raymond de Souza. Simultaneously with Brean's piece (April 13, 2006) Fr. De Souza expanded on the theme of "the descent of God," i.e. Jesus in the tomb, and its relationships to the fall of man as evidenced in contemporary society. But with the rising of Christ on Easter Day, "the descent of man is over too."

Earlier, Father de Souza had given short shrift to the Gospel of Judas manuscript (Post, April 10). In contrast, the Globe covered the subject under the title, "Was Judas a true Christian hero?" (April 7); and the Star carried "Judas cast in new light" (April 7), with numerous speculations from people who did not know that St. Irenaeus had consigned the "secret book" to the rubbish heap of heresy in the year 185 AD.

The Sun papers, at least the one in Toronto, carried the positive, no-nonsense columns of Michael Coren ("A matter of faith," April 15) and Father Thomas Rosica ("Benedict's year of acting quietly," April 23). Too bad the Sun's official religion writer, M. Mead Ward, once again showed her abysmal ignorance by going into rhapsodies over Judas on Easter Sunday (April 16).

Finally, belatedly, the Globe printed "Benedict's surprising year," an article by Michael Higgins, often contrary but this time quite positive. Higgins, now President of St. Thomas University in Fredericton, N.B., thought that Cardinal Ratzinger had proven himself "more conciliatory than expected" (April 19).

All in all, for good or bad, the central theme of the Christian faith--the Resurrection--was the focus of wide publicity in the daily press during this Easter season.