Ruth Gledhill’s TimesOnline blog post today, commented on by Gashwin Gomes here. She really drops the ball on this one:

An initial sceptic, I came round fast to Benedict XVI after seeing the way his honesty and spirituality shone through in much that he did, in a way different though equal to that of his predecessor. Recently, many have expressed regrets to me that he hasn’t been getting out more, doing and saying more, at a time when the world needs a strong, Christian voice to help it through these dark times. Everyone is missing that steady stream of encyclicals, telling us what to think on everything from capitalism to contraception. We might not have agreed with JPII, but we did like to argue about it.

Now we have heard the quieter, more studied voice of Benedict, speaking indeed in a strong, compelling-them-to-come-in, Dominus-Iesus-type of way that some thought they wanted of him. "Be careful what you pray for," the saying goes, and perhaps we can begin to understand why. My favourite headline today comes from The Sun: ‘Pope on the Ropes’. We are all surely praying harder than ever for him today as he balances still on the highwire that it is his daily vocation to walk, praying that his apology can save him, that he does not tumble off into the abyss, and take the rest of us with him when he falls.

Click on the link to "compelling-them-to-come-in" and see to whom she compares Benedict. Really?