Father McBrien is a leading liberal Catholic theologian, giving him a very different perspective from that of his host; he is also a serious historian of the Church. This rich discussion situates Pope John Paul II both in the current context and in the light of history. RM: "The powers which the pope had through fully one-half of the history of the Church--that is, the first millennium--were considerably more modest than the powers which the pope accrued ... beginning especially with the papacy of Gregory VII, the end of the 11th century. And I think John Paul II has-- It's almost a climactic moment, his pontificate. He hasn't usurped any power; he is exercising the canonical authority that accrued to the papacy in the second millennium, and he's exercised it more adeptly than any pope before him ... So one should stand back and admire him for using the powers that the canon law of the Church has given him since Gregory VII. But we don't want to say that those are powers which Jesus gave Peter."