c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) At Pope John Paul II’s funeral earlier this month, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger choked back tears as he delivered a deeply personal sermon about his old friend.

Ten days later, the German cardinal stood at the pulpit again, to deliver a stern speech about maintaining Roman Catholic tradition as the cardinals convened the conclave that would choose a new pontiff.

Those two high-profile homilies, with their blend of emotion and staunch conservatism, may be a sign of things to come as the new Pope Benedict XVI takes the helm of the church, theologians say.

Though many church watchers believe the 115 cardinals chose the 78-year-old Ratzinger as a short-term transitional pope, few expect him to sit quietly.

“This will be a different kind of papacy,” said Monsignor Raymond Kupke, an adjunct professor of church history at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. “I would see him as a very active pope.”

Ratzinger made his reputation as one of John Paul’s key defenders of church doctrine and traditional Catholic teaching. He served as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and dean of the College of Cardinals.

As a hard-line conservative, the new pope is expected to adhere to church doctrine on abortion, birth control and the role of women in the church.

Meanwhile, the cardinals would have time to consider who among them could serve as a long-term pope.

“It will be a briefer papacy that will give an opportunity for other candidates to emerge in a later conclave down the road,” Kupke said.

As Benedict XVI takes over, the church faces some serious issues. The new pope must deal with both the growth of Catholicism in the Third World and the declining power of the church in the West.

He also is expected to confront the lingering effects of the clergy sex scandal in the United States and the need to open a post-9/11 dialogue with Muslims.

“I really believe the church is in very safe hands,” said the Rev. Anthony Figueiredo, a former secretary to John Paul and an associate professor of systematic theology at Seton Hall.

The new pope is unlikely to remain mute on controversial topics, church observers said.

“We will see someone who is not afraid to speak the truth in a moment where the world is in flux,” Figueiredo said.

The new pope may have a hint of the flair of his charismatic predecessor. He speaks multiple languages, including English and Italian as well as his native German. He is an accomplished pianist with a passion for Mozart.

Like Pope John Paul II, he also has been shaped by political turmoil. He spent time in the German army during World War II and was briefly imprisoned in a U.S. prisoner-of-war camp before returning to the seminary.

But those who are hoping Ratzinger will adopt John Paul’s globe-trotting style may be disappointed, said Nikki Shepardson, as assistant professor of European history at Rider University, in Lawrenceville, N.J.

“He is a theologian first and foremost. John Paul was really a pastor,” said Shepardson, an expert on the history of Christianity. “I think he’ll probably go more toward a traditional-style papacy.”

As a church leader in Germany, Ratzinger had a reputation for clashing with more-liberal theologians. He carried on that tradition when John Paul tapped him in 1981 to serve as a guardian of church orthodoxy, as leader of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Together, Ratzinger and the pope cracked down on theologians teaching outside the Vatican mainstream on Catholic college campuses.

The Rev. Charles Curran, a former professor at Catholic University, had a tense face-to-face meeting with Ratzinger at the Vatican, and was driven from the classroom shortly afterward for his teachings on contraception in 1986.

Curran, now a professor at Southern Methodist University, said he was disappointed but not devastated by the elevation of Ratzinger to pope.

“This is obviously a sign that the papacy will continue in the same general way as the papacy of Pope John Paul II,” Curran said in a statement. “On the other hand, I think many Catholics in the United States were unrealistic about what might happen in this papal election.

“No new pope was going to dramatically change church teaching or discipline in the beginning of a new papacy.”

Any long-term shift in the church is likely to come from the grass roots, not the top, Curran said.

“Anyone familiar with the history of the Catholic Church knows that change in the Catholic Church comes about very slowly, but it also comes about from underneath,” he said.

MO/JL RNS END

(Kelly Heyboer is a reporter for the Star Ledger in Newark, N.J.)