The Political Spectrum

Except he wasn't Pope.

And he didn't condemn them.

Jimmy Akin has more.

And more.

And more, in particular:

In this case, Pope Benedict has said absolutely nothing about Harry Potter.

What the stories is based on is a pair of extremely short letters written by Cardinal Ratzinger. We therefore have a problem with LifeSite misrepresenting, in its headline, comments by a cardinal as comments by the pope. The fact that this cardinal later became pope is irrelevant. Cardinals have a liberty to say things that popes do not, and you cannot go rummaging around in things a cardinal said years before becoming pope and represent them in a fashion that will lead the casual reader to suppose that they are things that he has endorsed as pope.

Further, the two letters were not from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. They were private correspondence from Cardinal Ratzinger. We therefore have a problem, again on the headline level, with representing personal opinion in a way that would lead the reader to think of it as official.

Further, the two letters were written more than two years ago. We therefore have a problem with representing old material as if it were new. Note the tenses in the headline: "Pope Benedict opposes [present tense] Harry Potter." Uh-uh. Cardinal Ratzinger two years ago said things that sounded anti-Potter, but people can, y'know, change their minds on subjects, particularly as they learn more about them. You can't take a statement someone made two years ago and represent it as indicative of present opposition when, in fact, there has been NO present opposition.

And as the Seventh Age writes:

A private communication to a German friend saying, "ja, good article, you're probably right," is not a public statement that merits much attention without further reason. Even if the Pope had read the series and made the comments, which it is fairly certain he did not, Catholics are not bound to papal literary criticism. Catholics, said Chesterton, are bound in faith to agree on a few things, but tend to disagree about everything else.

Hat tips to Amy Welborn and Southern Appeal.