Schall on Deus Caritas Est

The erudite and always-reliable James Schall writes about the new encyclical. Excerpt:

One cannot help but be amused that Benedict cites the Emperor Julian the Apostate, the infamous persecutor of Christians, with some approval. Julian, it seems, had a rather difficult childhood. "As a child of six years old, Julian witnessed the assassination of is father, brother and other family members by guards of the imperial palace" (#24). Julian in retrospect blamed this heinous act on the Emperor Constantius' Christian faith. The only thing Julian liked about Christianity was its stress on active charity. So he went off and formed his own religion taking charity from Christianity but nothing else. The Pope concludes, "in this way, then, the Emperor confirmed that charity was a decisive feature of the Christian community, the Church." This may be the first time in ages that a Pope has cited an Apostate in confirmation of a basic Christian teaching!