A telephone survey commissioned by the Knights of Columbus found that U.S. Catholics think favorably of Pope Benedict XVI, who retired in February. The Marist poll, taken March 2-5 -- the week after Pope Benedict's February 28 retirement took effect -- found that Catholics held favorable impressions of the retired pontiff's tenure, his impact on their lives and the direction of both the church and the world. In the poll, 77 percent of all U.S. Catholics, and 82 percent of practicing Catholics, said they had ether a "positive" or "very positive" impression of the retired pope's pontificate. Asked about the outgoing pope himself, 69 percent of Catholics and 75 percent of practicing Catholics had a "positive" or "very positive" view of him. Similarly, 68 percent of Catholics and 77 percent of practicing Catholics said he had a "positive" or "very positive" impact on their life. Seventy percent of Catholics and 75 percent of practicing Catholics said the pope had a "positive" or "very positive" impact on the church's direction, while 65 percent of Catholics and 69 percent of practicing Catholics said in the poll he had a "positive" or "very positive" impact on the moral direction of the world.
The spiritual climax of the Gospel of John, as Father John Waiss points out, occurs at the foot of the Cross, where Jesus utters his parting words: “Woman, behold, your son!” and “Behold your mother!” (John 19:26-27). While these words were addressed to the Apostle John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, the Church has long understood this moment as a universal adoption. To truly image Christ, we must share in His parentage; if we embrace God as our spiritual Father but reject Mary as our mother, we treat Christ as a half-brother rather than our "firstborn among many brethren" (Rom. 8:29). As Origen noted as early as the third century, the profound depths of the Gospel are only accessible to those who, like John, rest their heads on Jesus’ breast and receive Mary into their own homes. This maternal role is deeply rooted in biblical typology, positioning Mary as the fulfillment of the great mothers of the Old Covenant. She is the New Eve , the mother of all the living according ...