THE MOST IMPORTANT STATEMENT Pope Benedict XVI may ever make was the one delivered before he was elected the successor to John Paul II. Just before he and his 114 colleagues entered the conclave, then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger addressed the entire College of Cardinals, the whole Roman Catholic Church, and the entire world in a homily that was both brief and extremely profound. After this homily was concluded, no one among the cardinals, indeed no one with any capacity for thinking, could be mistaken about what Cardinal Ratzinger believed about the times in which we live and the role of Jesus Christ and the Roman Catholic Church.

He finished his homily. The conclave began. And after less than a day and a half, he was elevated to the papacy.