Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) today released the following statement on the passing of Pope Benedict XVI:

            “Pope Benedict XVI was an extraordinary religious leader, a powerful defender of the weakest and most vulnerable including unborn children and their mothers and ever faithful in both living and promoting the good news of the Gospel.

            Pope Benedict XVI led us to be more faithful followers of Jesus Christ and His Church on earth.

            Pope Benedict XVI inspired countless believers to love God above all things and to love our neighbor as ourselves and was tenacious in defending the tenants of the Catholic Church and admonished us to recognize and resist the ‘dictatorship of relativism.’

            He was a great defender of religious freedom—and spoke of this in 2008 during his address at the White House and later at the UN.  Like millions, both my wife Marie and I were deeply touched by his words. 

            As prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for a quarter of a century—and a tremendous friend and ally of St. John Paul II—and then as Pope, he summed up his mission in a book in 2016: ‘I was conscious that my task was of another kind: that I must try above all else to show what faith means in the contemporary world, and further, to highlight the centrality of faith in God, and give people the courage to have faith, courage to live concretely in the world with faith.’

            Pope Benedict XVI was brilliant yet humble and courageous and spoke much of forgiveness and reconciliation.  What a blessing he was. Indeed what a blessing.”

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