Sharlet: I listened to the pope yesterday on a long drive from New York to New Hampshire. When I tuned in — NPR and BBC, depending on reception — NPR was swooning over the pomp and circumstance, casting about for the happy masses story. But the folks they got on the phone — supporters of the former Cardinal Ratzinger and cautious critics — kept complicating the narrative with words like “controversial” and “conservative.” NPR seemed loathe to follow up; the standard reply to such declarations from their guests was: “But is he a nice man?”

Consensus seemed to be that he is, his reputation among many as “God’s Rottweiler” and the “panzer cardinal” notwithstanding, and NPR was happy to leave it at that, with “criticism” reserved only for geographic concerns. “Why not South America?” NPR asked, with little evident understanding of Church conflicts on that continent.

But by the time I passed Brattleboro, the mood had changed. A correspondent for Newsweek called into say that the public reception in Rome was cool. And Catholic-on-the-street interviews were revealing a portrait of polarization. Some subjects said they were disappointed, surprised; you could hear the heartbreak in their voices. Others were enthusiastic, but they inadvertently tipped listeners off to what is at stake by insisting, over and over, that Pope Benedict XVI is notcontroversial.

There was much talk of ideology, “relativism” foremost among those discussed, and as I drove I racked my brain for self-declared “relativist” friends. Of course, the new pope, a staunch foe of such folk, would likely explain that relativism is a pernicious strain of thinking that afflicts those who’ve never even heard the term. Benedict, we’re told, is a brilliant intellectual. Which is why there’s something odd about the ease with which he — or his supporters — attribute a very grand worldview to the many who don’t actually bother considering worldviews at all.

There are no card-carrying relativists I know of, and at my destination, an arts colony, I met few who would merit such a label. There was a consensus here, too, among several painters and writers raised Catholic, most of them fallen away from the church: Ratzinger is bad news. Right or wrong, that ain’t relativism.

So what are Benedict fans talking about when they talk about relativism? And why do NPR and BBC and much of the rest of the press fail to question language that is vague at best, or maybe even another language all together, a wholly different set of meanings attached to ideas those labelled by them understand in — dare I say it — more traditional terms.

“Conservative” is another word of that sort, as those labeled “conservative” and those proud to be called “conservative” tell us often. It’s worth noting that although Benedict talks now of continuing the modernizing work of Vatican II, he has also rejected “modernity,” which, given that “modernity” has been around for awhile, is not a conservative stance.

I’ll leave aside the pointless question of whether Benedict is a transitional pope — he has been and will continue to be a major power within Catholicism; the prospect of a short papacy can’t diminish the influence he’s had for years. Benedict is an innovator; his “conservatism” is, in the scope of the Church, something new.

That’s the story the press should be examining — not the question of whether Josef Ratzinger is a nice man.