You jest. Card.Ratzinger/Pope Benedict seemed to engage in the theologically abusive practice of extending selective dimensions of metaphor to literalism and elevating that selection to theology and/or authoritarian directive. 
Example: He quotes from Genesis, "...and he shall rule over you" as God's literal and literally "definitive" sentence to Eve and all women under the titled document that addresses women "...in the church and in the world".  This from the CDF Prefect and "noted" scholar theologian. This is one element of what Daly seems to id as the "slimy underside".  
Maybe, this kind of indefensible contributed to his "retreat"?
See also the senseless defense of "natural resemblance" below.