January 2

Memorial of Saint Basil the Great
and Saint Gregory Nazianzen,
Bishops and Doctors of the Church


No OR today.

No scheduled events for the Holy Father.


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Make 2009 the 'Year of Africa'

Friday, January 2, 2008



'Tis the season for New Year’s resolutions, and in that spirit, I’d like to propose a resolution for Catholics everywhere: To make 2009 truly the “Year of Africa” that Pope Benedict XVI intends.

Three major events point to 2009 as a “Year of Africa” at the level of the Vatican and papal activity:
- Benedict’s scheduled visit in March to Cameroon and Angola;
- a plenary assembly of SECAM, the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar, to be staged in Rome in September, in order to galvanize Western interest;
- and a Synod for Africa, a gathering of bishops from around the world, to be held in the Vatican during October.

In a recent interview on Vatican Radio, the papal spokesperson, Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, laid out the logic for this “preferential option for Africa” in the coming year.

“The suffering of the African people is enormous,” Lombardi said. “There are terrifying massacres of the poor, and there are situations of famine, as we’ve seen in Zimbabwe in recent days.”

The question Benedict XVI intends to pose, Lombardi said, is this: “What must we do, not only to overcome these dramatic situations, but so that a continent of such great potential, of such enormous resources – both material and, above all, human resources – can make its contribution to humanity, and to the church of today and tomorrow?”

“The commitment of the Pope offers us an example,” Lombardi said, “but all of us must look to this continent in the year that’s coming.”

Without any doubt, Africa is where humanity today is most dramatically walking the Via Crucis:

- The number of Africans living in extreme poverty, meaning less than $1 a day, is projected by the United Nations to rise to 404 million in 2015.
- Some 800 million Africans suffer from chronic hunger, including 300 million children.
- Roughly 25 million Africans are living with HIV/AIDS, representing six percent of the adult population, with an estimated two million deaths each year. Between 12 and 14 million African children have been orphaned by AIDS.
- An estimated 11 million African children die each year due to preventable diseases such as malaria, measles, diarrhea and pneumonia.
- Forty-two million school-aged children in Africa are not enrolled in school. In 2000 alone, 860,000 children in sub-Saharan Africa lost teachers due to AIDS, and it’s estimated that some 15-20 percent of teachers on the continent have died from the disease.
- Between 1990 and 2005, twenty-three African nations have been involved in armed conflicts, claiming tens of millions of lives and, according to an Oxfam report, squandering almost $300 billion – an annual loss of 15 percent of Gross Domestic Product.

Upheaval in the Democratic Republic of Congo alone, according to one estimate, has left four million people dead – conflict fueled in part by a global scramble for Congo’s mineral resources, including cobalt, which is used in cell phone batteries.

On a recent trip to the United States, Bishop Fulgence Muteba Mugalu of Kilwa said that “Catholics and governments should understand that each cell phone contains a drop of innocent Congolese blood.”

Of course, the church’s interest in Africa is not exclusively humanitarian. Africa also represents the greatest “growth market,” so to speak, for Catholicism anywhere in the world.

The Catholic population of sub-Saharan Africa exploded from 1.9 million in 1900 to 139 million in 2000, a staggering growth rate of 6,708 percent. The Pope and other senior church leaders perceive a direct institutional interest in promoting peace and development in Africa, in order to consolidate these missionary gains.

Hence the obvious resolution for 2009: To do whatever we can, at whatever level and in whatever context we find ourselves, to promote thought, prayer and action on behalf of Africa.

To offer some concrete possibilities:

Leaders at the parish level could invite a local expert on Africa to address adult faith formation programs, to speak in the parish school, or to offer some brief reflections at the end of Sunday Mass. March offers a natural moment for such events, since Benedict will physically be in Africa at that time, as well as September and October, during the SECAM assembly and the Synod for Africa.

Few dioceses in the West these days don’t have at least one African priest. Make that guy a local celebrity in 2009, inviting him to say Mass in parishes around the diocese, to speak at deanery meetings, to visit Catholic schools, and so on.

Catholic charities already do Herculean work on behalf of Africa, and 2009 represents a natural moment to aggressively promote those activities. Special collections could be organized, new advocacy campaigns could be launched, and Africa experts can hit the road to tell their stories.

Catholic colleges and universities could launch new programs of academic study focusing on Africa, as well as high-profile lecture series and other public events. Inevitably, there’s ferocious disagreement among development experts about exactly how to promote change: some advocate massive assistance from developed nations, others focus on economic development and global trade, still others on fighting corruption. Catholic universities can offer a laboratory for testing ideas and fostering debate.

The Catholic press, both print and broadcast, could prepare a series of features on Africa, focusing both on the church on the continent as well as current political and social issues. Catholic media could make a commitment to integrating news from Africa more systematically into its routine coverage.

Catholic institutions of all sorts could be attentive to opportunities throughout 2009 to shine a spotlight on Africa. For example, whenever a visiting African bishop, religious sister, or lay activist happens to be in town, make a big deal out of it. Sponsor a public lecture, arrange for that person to meet with the local media, and so on.

Benedict XVI’s focus on Africa will help create an atmosphere in which people are paying attention, at least intermittently; the challenge is to exploit that atmosphere to raise consciousness at the local level.

While these ideas apply everywhere, they arguably have a special logic in America. Barack Obama is not only the President-elect of the United States, but also, effectively, the uncrowned king of Africa. He’s by far the most popular political figure in the world among Africans right now, a leader invested with almost messianic expectations. That gives him political capital on the continent that no other global figure can rival, creating a window of opportunity to make things happen. American Catholics can help push the Obama White House in this direction, and mobilize support if it responds.

There are, of course, serious obstacles to be overcome. The economic crisis in the United States creates a powerful temptation for Americans to turn inward, focusing on domestic problems. Whatever attention we have left over for foreign policy may be occupied by the crisis du jour in the Holy Land and by ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

For Catholics, there are also internal reasons why Benedict’s push on Africa may be a tough sell. “Peace and justice” Catholics tend to occupy the church’s left wing, which is sometimes crankily resistant to papal initiatives, even when they cut in a direction liberals otherwise support.

For example, an utterly predictable chorus is likely to arise on the Catholic left in ’09 to the effect of, “If the Pope wants to do something for Africa, why doesn’t he come out in favor of condoms to fight AIDS?” Such stale polemics often get in the way of doing something constructive.

Conservative Catholics, meanwhile, talk a good game about “thinking with the Church,” but can be selective in their follow-through. If the Pope criticizes abortion, they’re ready to mount the barricades; if he tackles poverty and war, many will quietly suggest he’s out of his depth, or that he’s wading into matters of prudential judgment that don’t oblige conscience.

All of that, however, makes turning 2009 into a “Year of Africa” complicated, not impossible. For reasons both pastoral and prophetic, Africa is a critical proving ground for the Catholic future. This is one case, moreover, in which no one can complain about papal “silence”.

The drama of ’09 is not whether the Pope will lead; it’s whether the rest of us will follow. Doing so is a resolution well worth making.

Year in review: U.S. Catholics receive
strong encouragement from Pope's visit
By Carol Zimmermann



WASHINGTON, Dec. 25 (CNS) -- U.S. Catholics were repeatedly encouraged to find renewed hope in Christ during Pope Benedict XVI's April 15-20 visit to the United States.

Whether the Pope was addressing international or religious leaders, youths or those Catholics who filled baseball stadiums in Washington and New York, he continually reiterated the trip's theme, "Christ Our Hope," and earnestly spoke of a "new springtime" for the church in America.

The Pontiff, in his first visit to the United States as Pope, celebrated Mass at the ballparks in both cities and spoke at the White House, the General Assembly of the United Nations and at churches in Washington and New York. He also departed from his planned itinerary for a private meeting with victims of the clergy sex abuse crisis.

He often spoke of the "genuinely religious spirit" of the American people and praised the vitality of parish life and church movements. But he also encouraged U.S. Catholics to take their faith experience to a deeper level by evangelizing with renewed zeal and rejecting secularism.

Instead of criticizing U.S. Catholics as some commentators had predicted, the Pope gently urged them to be unified and to be a beacon of hope in the modern world.

The visit had been highly anticipated since it was announced in November 2007. Many wondered how the scholarly Pontiff would compare with the crowd-pleasing Pope John Paul II.

But in all the public venues the cheering crowds dispelled the notions of Americans not warming up to Pope John Paul's successor.

There was pre-visit speculation about whether the Pope would address the clergy abuse scandal -- which he did several times -- and what he would say to Catholic college presidents -- he offered them words of encouragement.

Right from the start -- aboard the papal flight to the U.S. -- Pope Benedict addressed the clergy abuse crisis that had scarred the U.S. church, saying he was "deeply ashamed" of it. Throughout the U.S. visit he condemned the abuse scandal and spoke of the urgent need for healing.

During a Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York for priests and religious, the Pope urged the congregation to move past divisions and scandal toward a "new sense of unity and purpose."

In other gatherings he sounded warnings on the dangers of secularism and the misuse of freedom.

During an April 17 Mass at Nationals Park, Washington's baseball stadium, he told 45,000 people that American society is at a moral crossroads. Three days later at a Mass at New York's Yankee Stadium, the Pope urged more than 57,000 Catholics "to use wisely the blessings of freedom in order to build a future of hope for coming generations."

Pope Benedict also made a special appeal to young people at the Yankee Stadium Mass, urging them to "step forward and take up the responsibility which your faith in Christ sets before you." He offered a similar challenge to about 25,000 youths the previous day during a rally at St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, N.Y.

In Washington, the Pope urged 400 Catholic college presidents and diocesan education representatives at The Catholic University of America to lead students to deeper faith.

He also told about 200 representatives of Islam, Jainism, Buddhism, Hinduism and Judaism at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center "to persevere in their collaboration" to serve society and enrich public life.

The Pope began his U.S. visit by meeting privately with President George W. Bush after he was greeted by thousands of well-wishers during a public welcoming ceremony on the White House lawn.

He spoke to about 300 U.S. bishops at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception encouraging them to continue their work to restore trust in the church and its ministers.

In New York, he told the U.N. General Assembly that fundamental human rights "cannot be applied piecemeal" and cannot be denied or diminished because of "different cultural, political, social and even religious outlooks."

One of his most somber visits was at Ground Zero where the Pope knelt alone and offered a silent prayer. He also read a prayer aloud with a small group at his side representing survivors, the family members of the dead and representatives of the New York Port Authority, police and fire departments.

At an ecumenical prayer service in New York he expressed concern that Christianity could slip into "fragmentation and a retreat into individualism."

Pope Benedict met separately with the Jewish participants in the inter-religious meeting. He also visited a New York synagogue.

The Pope had two occasions of his own to mark while in the United States: his 81st birthday and the third anniversary of his election as Pope.

After his departure, many U.S. Catholics said they felt a deeper connection with their spiritual leader and that the effects of the visit would last beyond the six-day trip as they planned to read and reread the texts of his speeches.

For many, what stood out the most was not the huge crowds at papal events but his private meeting at the apostolic nunciature in Washington with five victims of clergy sexual abuse.

One observer summed it up by saying the Pope did "exactly what American Catholics needed and wanted to see" from the person who is the highest authority in the Church.

Still pending:
Who will lead the Catholics
of England and Wales?
by Robert Mickens

Issue of Jan. 3, 2009


See related story posted yesterday in NOTABLES, in which a British newspaper reports that Pope Benedict had chosen Abbot Gilbert of Pluscarden Abbey in Scotland to be the next Archbishop of Westminster (Catholic Primate of England and Wales) but that Gilbert changed his mind after one of his monks left to get married.

Mickens offers a view of the bishop-naming processs and the apparent difficulty of finding new bishops to replace hundreds of metropolitans who have reached the canonical retirement age of 75 and more.


Pope Benedict XVI, in the Year of Our Lord 2009, will have a remarkable opportunity to shape further the archiepiscopal landscape of the Catholic Church around the world.

As Britons wonder and worry about who the Pope will pick to succeed the nation's top Catholic leader in Westminster, Catholics in several other cities also wait to see who will replace their own ageing cardinal-archbishops. They include New York, Seoul, Cologne, Prague, Guadalajara and Manila - to name but a few.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, at 76, is not the only cardinal beyond the canonical retirement age of 75 who is still in office.

Twelve others are even further along in years, including Cardinal Michael Kitbunchu of Bangkok, who will be 80 later this month, and Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit, who will be 79 in March. They are among the 21 cardinals over 75 who, at the end of 2008, were still governing Latin Rite archdioceses around the world. And during the course of 2009 four more cardinals will cross this threshold.

That is only the tip of the iceberg. Prelates aged 75 and older currently head more than 200 local dioceses. Fifty-five of these are archdioceses. And a further 118 diocesan/archdiocesan ordinaries will reach retirement age during this year.

But even more critical than the ageing of the episcopate is the fact that more than 90 dioceses and seven archdioceses are currently "vacant", that is, they do not even have an ordinary. At least 38 of these places have been vacant since 2007 or earlier, all but 10 of them because the Vatican "promoted" or "retired" the ordinary without naming a successor.

These statistics suggest that Pope Benedict and his aides do not always have an easy time finding the right man for the right job. Perhaps that is why some Vatican officials - the Pope included - are said to be intent on raising the retirement age to 78.

Over the last two centuries the appointment of bishops has emerged as one of the central duties - and means of power - of the modern papacy. This is especially true when it comes to naming archbishops (even those who are not cardinals), because these men head some of the Catholic Church's oldest, largest and most important local churches.

The Pope relies heavily on recommendations from the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples (Propaganda Fide) when naming bishops for dioceses in "mission" territory such as Africa and Asia or the Congregation for Oriental Churches when approving heads of Eastern Rite dioceses.

For almost everywhere else, including Westminster, the Pope is assisted by the Congregation for Bishops. The Congregation's procedures in episcopal appointments is unveiled in a chapter of the 1989 book Archbishop by Fr Thomas Reese SJ, which, Vatican officials say, remains a valid point of reference even today.

For example, the papal nuncio to Britain, Archbishop Faustino Sainz Muñoz, is the man who would have done most of the initial preparation for vetting and suggesting a successor to Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor.

First of all, he would have consulted the cardinal and requested his detailed analysis of the state of the archdiocese and its needs. The nuncio would have also queried other British bishops, as well as priests and reliable lay Catholics of the archdiocese - and anyone else he deemed to be informative and useful. The process takes much time and discretion and involves a limited number of people. But, above all, it is highly confidential.

Once the nuncio has completed the consultations he draws up a detailed report, which he sends with many pages of documentation to the Congregation for Bishops. Included is the all-important terna, or list of the top three candidates.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols (Birmingham) and Archbishop Peter Smith (Cardiff) are believed to have secured a place on the terna for Westminster. Speculation has been divided over whether the third candidate was Bishop Malcolm McMahon OP (Nottingham) or Bishop Arthur Roche (Leeds). Naturally, the speculation could be wrong and any other variety of names may have been on the nuncio's terna.

Whatever the case, the material is then sent to Rome (it can sometimes fill up several boxes) and the priest-staff member at the Congregation who deals with dioceses in Britain carefully checks it for accuracy or missing information.

Once this process is completed, the undersecretary at the Congregation asks a cardinal member to study the material and then prepare and present a summary for the other members. This cardinal presenter is called the ponente.

The presentation takes place at one of the Congregation's fortnightly meetings in Rome and afterwards the members vote on the candidate they think should be appointed to the relative see. Unfortunately not everyone is able to attend these meetings.

There are 32 members of the Congregation for Bishops - 26 cardinals and six archbishops. Fifteen of these are heads of Roman Curia offices and another eight are retired (but aged under 80) Vatican officials who live in Rome. Only seven of the members are residential bishops, while another is the Pope's Vicar for Rome. Twenty-four of them are over the age of 70.

All but five of the Congregation's 32 members did theological studies in Rome, which is helpful because the meetings are always conducted in Italian. This is reinforced by the fact that 11 of the 24 European members are from Italy - including the Congregation's prefect, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re.

The only members whose native tongue is English are four cardinals from the United States. There are also four men from Latin America and three each from Poland and Germany among the members. This is the make-up of the group of men who will have voted on the terna and suggested to Pope Benedict who should be the next Archbishop of Westminster.

Cardinal Re would have hand-delivered this information at one of the routine private audiences he has each Saturday with the Pope. Once he receives a recommendation the Pope can immediately name the new bishop or he can wait and ponder his decision for an indeterminate amount of time. Benedict XVI seems to favour the latter approach.

It is hard to know how much influence an outgoing bishop might have in naming his own successor. Obviously, it is helpful if he is held in high esteem by the prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, the members of the Congregation and, of course, the Pope.

Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor had an opportunity to give his opinion a few weeks ago when he had a rare private meeting with Pope Benedict.

In any event, it is a good bet that the man who finally gets Westminster will have already been a bishop. In all but a very, very few cases Pope Benedict has chosen Latin Rite archbishops from among already-serving diocesan ordinaries or auxiliaries.

Among the exceptions were two of Pope John Paul II's private secretaries - now-Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz (Krakow) and recently appointed Archbishop Miroslaw Mokrzycki (Lviv).

The only other exceptions were Italians. The Pope directly appointed three priests to head small archdioceses in Italy but, more surprisingly, he named an Italian priest from the Catholic political organisation Communion and Liberation to be archbishop and head the Apostolic Administration in Moscow.

Westminster's succession has drawn intense media attention in Britain, and understandably so. After all, this will be Pope Benedict's first chance to name an archbishop in Great Britain.

Up to now he has only had the opportunity to appoint three of the 22 diocesan bishops in England and Wales plus five auxiliaries. And he has also named two of the eight bishops in Scotland.

Movers and shakers in Westminster continue to suggest that Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor's resignation is likely to be accepted in the next few weeks and that a successor will be named the same day.

However, it is never wise to try to set a time-line to episcopal appointments, especially in the current pontificate. But when the day finally arrives, perhaps Pope Benedict will also appoint a new bishop to the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle.

Lest anyone forget, the 200,000 Catholics that make up England's most northern diocese have been without a shepherd since last March following the death of Bishop Kevin Dunn.



Mickens has a second article in the same issue, and I am more than surprised that he chose to file a straight news report, with no finger-wagging editorializing for a change! Too bad he only chose to report on one aspect of the all-important papal address on December 22 to the Roman Curia.



Pope focuses on marriage, family
in key Christmas addresses
by Robert Mickens

Issue of Jan. 3, 2009


Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday threw his support behind a huge pro-family rally in Madrid in what was the latest in a recent series of widely reported comments he has made on traditional marriage and human sexuality.

"Dear families, do not allow love, openness to life and the incomparable bonds that unite your families to become distorted," he said in Spanish during the midday Angelus from his window overlooking St Peter's Square at the Vatican.

The message was broadcast live to Madrid where hundreds of thousands of Catholics joined Cardinal Antonio María Rouco Varela at an outdoor Mass. The purpose was to support traditional marriage in the face of the Socialist Government's liberal reforms, including legalised same-sex marriage, quicker divorces and easier abortions.

"The Pope is by your side," Benedict XVI told the Catholic Spaniards on the Feast of the Holy Family. Cardinal Rouco avoided criticising the Spanish Government at the Mass, following reports that Pope Benedict had asked the Spanish bishops to be less confrontational.

The Pope also urged Catholics at his Angelus to pray for the Sixth World Meeting of Families, which is to take place 14-18 January in Mexico City.

In contrast to other recent speeches on the family Pope Benedict made no allusion to same-sex unions. However, in a message on 18 December to Sweden's new ambassador to the Holy See, he insisted on the "fundamental importance for society of the institution of marriage, understood as a lifelong union between a man and a woman, open to the transmission of life".

On the same day he told the new ambassador from Belize there were "growing threats to the institution of the family" that had to be thwarted by supporting traditional marriage.

Then on 22 December, Pope Benedict made headlines around the world when in his annual holiday address to members of the Roman Curia he offered a step-by-step explanation of the cosmos - and of human beings - as being created and ordered, with an "intelligent structure", by God.

"It is not outdated metaphysics if the Church speaks of the nature of the human being as man and woman and asks that this order of creation be respected," the Pope said.

He then went on to say that if people shunned this "language of creation" they would end up destroying themselves and the "very work of God".

"That which is often expressed and understood as ‘gender' ultimately ends up in the self-emancipation of man from the created realm and the Creator," he said.

"The tropical forests merit, yes, our protection, but man as creature does not merit it any less," Pope Benedict insisted, before reaffirming the sanctity of marriage: "Great theologians of scholasticism defined matrimony, that is the lifelong union between a man and woman, as the sacrament of creation that the Creator himself instituted and which Christ - without modifying the message of Creation - then embraced in the history of his covenant with man."

The Pope said it was "in this perspective" that people needed to re-read the 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae. "The intention of Pope Paul VI," he said, "was to defend love against sexuality as consumption ... and the nature of man against its manipulation."

For the new year, the Pope
once again underscores
evangelical and universal values
Editorial
by Giovanni Maria Vian
Translated from
the 1/2-1/3/09 issue of



Formulating his wishes for the year that has just begun gave the Pope - especially in the evocative liturgies that marked the religious feasts during the calendar year transition - an occasion to share his reflections on the present historical moment.

Above all, his reflections on time - which are traditional for the season but not any less true - as a gift from the Creator to be used by his creatures to do good. A gift that must not be wasted from that God who entered time to manifest himself in human flesh as a 'friend of man'.

The coming of God that we celebrate during the Christmas season anticipated the second coming - the definitive one invoked from the earliest days of Christianity - and brought hope to the world. Not a vague and generic sentiment, but with the awareness that history has an end.

We must educate ourselves - and most of all, the young - in this hope, which impacts the daily life of every human being. Even in the current world crisis which is a cause for unease and concern, if not direct difficulties, for everyone today.

Coming to the world in a poverty that he chose deliberately, Jesus proposes it as a choice for man, to be distinguished from a poverty that offends justice, the Holy Father pointed out.

Thus, we need to rediscover moderation and solidarity - evangelical values that are also universal, and which are necessary to build peace as the true fruit of justice: Opus iustitiae pax (Peace is the work of justice).

There was a singular consonance between what Benedict XVI said and the year-end messages from German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian President Giorgio Napolitano - at the end of a year during which the Pope and the Italian chief of state met more than once, with an evident concord between Rome's two emblematic hills, the Quirinal and the Vatican, on the eve of the 80th anniversary of the Lateran Pacts.

None of these messages were merely ritual speeches. [As the Pope said], the world crisis during this era of globalization must be read profoundly, not only as a short-term emergency, as a valuable opportunity for radical change - of lifestyles, economies, relationships between persons and among nations.

Indeed, said the Bishop of Rome, there are multiple forms of poverty that must be fought, in the face of which Benedict XVI once more raised his voice to denounce forcefully 'the unacceptable growth of the arms race' which is a violation of the very Charter of the United Nations, as well as the eye-for-an-eye violence that is fuelling the new war in the Gaza Strip, striking hardest at the poorest citizens on both sides.

Indeed, crisis can be truly an opportunity to reflect deeply - that time runs on, and man needs to achieve the peaceful revolution that begun when God became man for us. But this needs, as Benedict XVI underscored, 'infinite patience' and time, because peace results from 'maturation of responsibility in human consciences', among believers and non-believers alike.

Moderation and fraternal solidarity, he said, are values that are both evangelical and universal, as is the peace that comes with justice.

How media distorted pope's call for human ecology

Irish Times
Sat, Jan 03, 2009

Opportune distortion of the pontiff's words led to a fixation on transsexuality and homosexuality, writes Breda O'Brien

ACCORDING TO international news agency Reuters, Pope Benedict XVI said that saving humanity from homosexual or transsexual behaviour was just as important as saving the rainforest from destruction. The Italian media somehow missed this entirely, and instead focused on the pope allegedly saying he was not a rock star. Both approaches managed to miss the point. While the "I am not a rock star" angle merely smacked of the blindingly obvious, the Reuters report resulted in a great deal of international commentary, most outraged.

Had the pope actually said saving humanity from homosexual behaviour was as important as saving the rainforest, the hurt and outrage would have been justified. He didn't.

Being misquoted is commonplace for anyone in public life, and in fairness, the Vatican does itself no favours by being so slow about issuing English translations of papal statements. However, given the rapidity with which unofficial translations appeared on the internet, some of the commentary seems more aimed at what commentators want to believe the pope said rather than what he actually said.

The pope's talk is a meditation on how the Church carries out its mission in the world and the role of the Holy Spirit. It contains a robust defence of World Youth Day. This is significant, given that it was widely assumed that as Cardinal Ratzinger, the current pontiff was not enthused about Pope John Paul II's innovative gathering of millions of young people every two years.

On the contrary, the pope defends World Youth Day from the allegation it is some kind of Catholic rock festival and essentially meaningless aside from the "feelgood" factor it generates. Instead, he says World Youth Day is the fruit of intense preparation, and that the joy that it generates is an important means of communicating the Christian message. With that kind of dry intellectual wit that characterises him, the pope enlists Nietzche in explaining what he means.

"Friedrich Nietzsche once said: 'Success does not lie in organising a party, but in finding people capable of drawing joy from it.' According to Scripture, joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22), and this fruit was absolutely palpable during those days in Sydney." The "rock star" headlines were generated by the pope saying he is not the focus of World Youth Day, much less the star. (He never uses the term "rock star".) Instead, he is there only to point to Christ.

Later in his speech, the pope goes on to affirm that creation is not just random but has an intrinsic order and energy, born from the goodness of God. His address assumes that protection of creation is a vital part of being a Christian. As human beings, we are part of creation, and therefore also need "a human ecology", a way of living that is in tune with our deepest nature.

The pope used the English word "gender" in his address. "That which is often expressed and understood by the term 'gender', in the end amounts to the self-emancipation of the human person from creation and from the Creator. Human beings want to do everything by themselves, and to have exclusive control of everything regarding themselves. But, in this way, the human person lives in denial of the truth, in conflict with the Creator Spirit."

Gender theory states that the biological sexual differences between males and females account for a relatively small part of the actual differences between men and women.

It declares most of these differences are matters not of sex but of gender which, unlike sex, is socially formed and cultivated. A subtext is that these socially determined roles are used to oppress women and minorities.

Obviously, it is true, to some degree, gender roles are socially constructed, in the sense they have changed throughout history. For millennia, women were seen as inferior and incapable of holding power. However, to extrapolate from that historic injustice that the biological basis of some gender differences is minimal leads to damaging distortions.

In medicine, there is a growing recognition that men and women are different even in the way they experience disease. Women, for example, get different heart attack symptoms from men, which can lead to women ignoring vital warning signs that could save their lives.

Other writers, such as Louann Brizendine in the Female Brain, show there are significant biological differences in male and female brains that influence behaviour. For example, the male brain has 2½ times more space dedicated to sexuality, as well as larger centres for action and aggression.

Perhaps it was the fact that the pope reiterated the church's support for traditional marriage that led the Reuters reporter to see his comments on gender as an attack on homosexuality. However, it is a frankly bizarre reading of a complex address.

In context, his comments on gender read as an examination of hubris, the idea that we can ignore our physical realities and shape ourselves in whatever way that we wish, as though we were merely minds and had no bodies. It is the same hubris that leads us to act as if we are independent from the rest of creation, and can therefore treat the environment in any way that we wish without incurring drastic consequences.

In fact, the idea that biological differences matter is probably of more relevance to heterosexuals. Our culture has embarked on an extraordinary cultural change, where women are supposed to be able to act like single males even when they have family commitments. At the same time, they are supposed to be hypersexualised parodies of women, always available for sex. These conflicting messages lead to unbelievable levels of stress for women.

Similarly, men are constantly being urged to be more like women. For example, we are told that suicide rates would drop if men would only talk about their problems.

However, research is beginning to show that men communicate in entirely different ways, and are flooded by deeply unpleasant emotions if they attempt to relate in the way that women do. In the context of what science is beginning to show us about male-female differences, a call for a "human ecology" that takes our nature and differences into account begins to look not incendiary, but imperative.

Thank you, Benefan! I was very happy to read that one.

Since I've been sort of taken over by - and into my husband’s Irish Clan (even when I was still a very feisty and very outspoken protestant - the first in that family!!), I'm very happy to see that there is reason in Irish journalism!! I did read a few more of her articles. I'm quite impressed.

Thank you and Happy New Year!!!

January 3
Feast of the Most Holy Name of Jesus
St. Genevieve, Virgin

OR for 1/2-1/3/08:

At Angelus on the World Day for peace, the Pope calls for
'A world order worthy of man'

The double issue also includes the texts of the Pope's homily at the Mass on New Year's Day, at which he appealed for a truce
in the hostilities in Gaza; and the year-end Vespers and Te Deum of Thanksgiving the day before. There is a Page 1 editorial
(translated three posts above) on Benedict's call for the world to rediscover the evangelical values of moderation and
solidarity as universal values urgently needed to face the current world crisis.

Page 1 news stories have to do with the continuing conflict in Gaza. In the inside pages, there are four related stories based
on a private audience Paul VI gave Jewish historian-journalist Arrigo Levi in January 1969 which was not intended as
an interview but in which the Pope commented freely on many subjects. Quite fascinating.


No papal events scheduled today.

Among the appointments announced today, the Holy Father named
- Cardinal Karl Lehmann, Archbishop of Mainz (Germany) as a member of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and
- Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli, President of the said council, as a member of the Congregation for Bishops.

The Vatican also released the Holy Father's Apostolic Letter of December 28, 2008, naming Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone
as his Legate to the VI World Encounter of Families to be held in Mexico City on January 13-18.

POST-SCRIPT TO THE 2008 FIGURES FOR PAPAL AUDIENCES


On the day the Vatican Prefecture of the Pontifical Household released their figures for attendance at the Pope's general and special audiences, liturgical celebrations and Angelus prayers for 2008,

I posted the corresponding Catholic News Service story with it - as typical of the reports that came out in the MSM - which saw the report as evidence (and making much of it), of how the attendance at Benedict XVI's public events has been steadily dropping since the 'peak' registered in 2006, his first full year as Pope. For instance, Marco Politi in Repubblica would gleefully reckon that the Pope had lost 1.8 million in attendance figures in just 3 years. I commented then, based on the first reports I saw (not including Politi's):

---

What stories like this miss is plausible explanations for the lower figures.

Quite apart from the fact that there were less papal audiences held this year than in the two previous years (and that a few of them were held in Castel Gandolfo where the courtyard can only accommodate 3,000-4,000), what most of the reporters fail to note is that 2005 and 2006 included mega-gatherings with attendance far in excess of 100,000 at each event (like Benedict's inaugural Mass in 2005, the big youth rallies at St. Peter's Square, the Mass for his birthday in 2006, just to mention those that come to mind right away) - and there just was not any single event of that magnitude in 2008.

The biggest monthly attendance for special audiences in 2008 was May when the single mega-event of 2008 that drew at least 100,000 participants to St. Peter's Square was an encounter with representatives of Italian Catholic Action from all over Italy.

The one other month that registered a figure larger than 100,000 was March, for its liturgical celebrations that included Palm Sunday, and all the Holy Week liturgies including Easter Sunday.

With the global financial crisis, visitors to Rome may well be reduced in 2009 compared to previous years.

---

Well, is my face blazingly crimson today, after Lella points out in her blog that the Vatican figures obviously did not even take into account the 'rally' in support of the Pope that was mobilized virtually overnight in January 2008 after the La Sapienza episode - at which an estimated 200,000-250,000 turned up for the Sunday Angelus following that missed Thursday appearance at the university. That was the true mega-event of 2008, and it completely skipped my mind! I stand happily corrected!

Note the figure in the table for the Angelus attendance in January 2008 - which shows only 150,000 for all the Angelus audiences that month! Even if there had been zero attendance for all the other Sundays in January, that would still leave the total monthly figure far short of that January 20 crowd.

Also, the figures released by the Vatican are based on the number of tickets they issue for the ticketed events, which does not account for those who do attend without tickets, but worse, mixes these ticket numbers with estimates of attendance at Angelus, which is not ticketed. (This goes for all the attendance figures released by the Vatican even in John Paul II's time.) There should be a better way of quantifying these figures if they must be quantified at all.

In the Holy Father's main Angelus message on New Year's Day, he said something that struck me profoundly when I heard it first, and even more, when I was translating it, so I highlighted one particular statement in bold face when I first posted that translation, as ff.

---

It is not enough, as Jesus would say, to place new patches on old clothes (cfr Mk 2, 21). To place the poor in first place means to move decisively towards that global brotherhood that John Paul II had said was necessary, bringing together the potentials of the market with those of civilian society (cfr Message, 3), in constant respect of legality, and always aiming for the common good.

Jesus Christ did not organize campaigns against poverty but he announced the Gospel to the poor, towards an integral rescue from material and moral poverty. The Church does the same thing, with its incessant work of evangelization and human promotion.

---

I had in mind at the time to comment on it as a fresh way for the Pope to say that Jesus did not come to earth to be primarily a social activist as bleeding-heart liberals and leftist liberation theologians have been insisting all along - even to the point of ignoring Jesus's spiritual mission, let alone his divinity!

Perhaps all the other normally reliable Vaticanistas were still working out their New Year's Day postprandial/post-libational hebetude as I was, but the following is the first report I have seen that refers to it.

A couple of Italian writers did refer to the Pope's concept of the two kinds of poverty possible in the world - one that is elected by personal choice, as in the vows taken by some priests and religious; the other wrong and offensive, since it it is the result of injustice.

I do not doubt Benaddicts who read every papal text with attention could not have failed to notice the Holy Father's emphases, and though
Spero's Martin Barillas virtually translates the entire Angelus message in this report, Benedict XVI's words are always worth re-reading:



Violence, hatred, and distrust
are also forms of poverty,
says Benedict XVI
by Martin Barillas

Jan. 2, 2008


Jesus, said the Pope, did not organize campaigns against poverty, but preached the Gospel "did not organize campaigns against poverty but proclaimed the Gospel for a complete ransom from moral and material misery to the poor."

On the morning of January 1st, at St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI celebrated a Mass marking the Virgin Mary's motherhood of Jesus Christ, which also marks the 42nd World Day of Peace, the theme of which is "Fighting Poverty to Build Peace" for 2009.

Commenting on the World Day of Peace during his homily, the Pope explained that there exists, on one hand, "the poverty chosen and proposed by Jesus and, on the other hand, the poverty that must be fought to make the world more just and united".

"The birth of Jesus in Bethlehem", he said, "shows us that God chose poverty for Himself in His coming among us. ...His love for us prompted Jesus not only to make Himself human but even to make Himself poor".

Nevertheless, he added, there exists "a poverty that prevents persons and families from living their dignity; a poverty that offends justice and equality and that, as such, threatens peaceful living together".

In his message this year the Pope recalled that "in the face of diffuse plagues such as pandemic illnesses, the poverty of children, food crises" he had returned to denouncing "the unacceptable arms race".

Referring to the phenomenon of globalization, said that it is necessary that nations "make the effort to maintain a high level of solidarity".

Benedict XVI asked if "we are prepared to read the current economic crisis in its complexity as a challenge for the future and not just as an emergency to which to give short term answers. Are we ready to make a profound change in the dominant model of development together, to correct it concretely and for the long term? Even more than the immediate financial difficulties, the state of the planet's ecological health and, above all, the cultural and moral crisis whose symptoms have been evident all over the world demand it."

"In order to fight the iniquitous poverty that oppresses many men and women and threatens the peace of all, it is necessary to rediscover sobriety and solidarity as evangelical and, at the same time, universal values. Misery cannot be effectively fought" if "the gap between those who waste the superfluous, and those who don't even have the necessary is not lessened", he affirmed.

The Holy Father entrusted to the Virgin Mary "the deep desire of living in peace that dwells in the hearts of the great majority of Israeli and Palestinian peoples who are once more placed in danger by the intense violence in the Gaza Strip in response to other violence".

"Violence, hate, and distrust are also forms of poverty - perhaps the worst - that must be fought". In this sense he also expressed "the justified hope that, with wisdom and the far-sighted contribution of all, it will not be impossible to listen to one another, to meet with one another, and to give concrete answers to the diffuse desire to live in peace, security, and dignity".

Following the Mass, the Pope addressed pilgrims assembled at St. Peter's Square with whom he prayed. He wished them a happy New Year and appeared to quell anxiety over the current world economic crisis, saying that "with the Lord's grace - and only with it - can we have ever-new hope that the future will be better than the past".

With the message for the World Day of Peace, the theme of which is "Fighting Poverty to Build Peace" in 2009, he affirmed that his wish "is to dialogue anew with those responsible at national levels and in international organizations, offering the Catholic Church's contribution in promoting a new world order worthy of the human being".

"At the beginning of the new year", he said, "my first objective is precisely to invite all leaders and ordinary citizens not to be disheartened in the face of difficulties or failures, and to renew their commitments".

The Holy Father noted that "in the second part of 2008, an economic crisis of vast proportions arose. This crisis must be examined in detail as a serious symptom that requires intervention at its roots. It is not enough - as Jesus would say - to take a piece from a new cloak to patch an old one.

"Putting the poor in first place means decidedly moving toward the global solidarity that John Paul II pointed out as necessary, co-ordinating the potentialities of the market with those of civil society in constant respect of the law and tending always to the common good".

"Jesus Christ", the Pope concluded, "did not organize campaigns against poverty but proclaimed the Gospel for a complete ransom from moral and material misery to the poor. The Church, with its unceasing labors of evangelization and human promotion, does the same. We call on the Virgin Mary, Mother of God, to help all men and women walk together the Path of peace".

2008 for the Pope:
More lights than shadows
in an intensely active year

Translated from

Jan. 1, 2008



Salvatore Izzo, Vaticanista of AGI, said in his year-end review of the Papacy: "The difficulty that emerged in the last few weeks of 2008 in how to present the positions of the Church and have these positions properly understood would seem to show 2008 in chiaroscuro rather than what Benedict XVI has every right to claim as a year of extraordinary successes."

Indeed, with his trip to the United States in April and his oourageous denunciations, he succeeded to regain for the Church much of the credit it had lost with the scandal of pedophile priests. In Sydney, World Youth Day was the greatest assembly ever seen in Oceania, opening up new limitless territories - whose remoteness to the Gospel is not merely geographical. Unexpectedly huge crowds acclaimed him even in France last September, evidently approving of his invitation to a positive secularity.

Even in his three Italian pastoral visits of 2008 (to Liguria, Puglia and Sardinia), which culminated in his call in Cagliari for a new political class in Italy, Papa Ratzinger mobilized large audiences and showed the Church in Italy in the best light, even after the departure from the public ministry of personages like Cardinals Carlo Maria Martini and Camillo Ruini.

Finally, with the assembly of the Bishops' Synod in October, he succeeded in launching a most daring enterprise: to place the Bible at the center of Catholic life, while reaffirming that it should be read in the context of Catholic tradition as a synthesis of the Old and New Testaments with Christ at the center.

There was near-unanimous consensus on the Word of God among the bishops, quite unlike some significant dissent expressed by some of them the year before on the matter of liberalizing the use of the traditional Mass.

Benedict XVI could even be happy about some progress with China, perhaps best symbollized by the concert offered by the China Philharmonic at the Vatican, at the initiative of the daughter of the late Deng Xiaoping (the venerable Chinese leader who decided to launch China's Communist society into capitalism after Mao Zedong and the Cultural Revolution). This, despite the chill that seemed to follow the Pope's pastoral letter to the Catholics of China in 1977.

But alongside these indisputable successes, there were the unevitable incomprehensions - sometimes true and proper disputations - directed at the Holy See because of a series of equivocal moves if not outright errors in communications by the Vatican.

The most notable of these was the gaffe by the Vatican's permanent observer to the United Nations, who gave a sketchy reply to a question from a French news agency interviewer regarding a proposed United Nations declaration about homosexuality.

Archbishop Celestino Migliore said the Vatican would oppose the French initiative to prohibit countries from making homosexuality a crime (as it is in some 70 countries around the world, including most Muslim countries), but his answer was too bare to make clear why - and it was immediately singled out and interpreted to mean that the Church was totally condemning homosexuals.

One can certainly make the case, as was autoritatively done afterwards, that the media had 'forced' a negative interpretation of Mons. Migliore's words to support their own prejudices against the Church, but the fact remains that such an important Church position first came to public attention through an almost throwaway line in an interview that treated of many other things. And was promptly misconstrued!

The reaction almost approached the dimensions of the media storm caused by the Pope's citation of Manuel II Paleologue in his Regensburg lecture, confirming the necessity for the Vatican to adapt not only of a more attentive and correct media strategy but also a more aware management of communications.

A missed opportunity, in this sense, was the Instruction from the Congregation for the Doctirne of the Faith on certain bioethical issues, including the Church position on assisted reproduction.

For the first time, a Church document affirmed the moral licitness of attempts to make parents of couples who have infertility problems, provided these attempts met the moral standards of the faith. But the Instruction came across to the media largely as yet another series of categorical No's.

Nor has it been helpful to the Pope that some Curial officials have been very strident about issues like Spain's secularist laws or the case of Eluana Englaro - in both cases, before the issues had been settled, and using openly provocative language, utterly disregarding the fact that media's tendency to oversimplify would convey to the public a certain absurtdity that has little to do with what the Church really is.

Prudence is also called for even in making announcements that are based on speculation, such as those that have been made by some cardinals about the Pope's third encyclical, that has been unofficially anticipated at least five times in the past year.

This gives the impression that it is being held up by some arcane meanderings within the Vatican bureaucracy, when it is more realistic not to expect more than one encyclical in the space of a year.

But above all, there was the announcement made by the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem about the Pope's visit to the Holy Land in May, which political developments may not make possible at this time. [I believe the protocol about papal visits is that the local bishop does not announce the visit until he is authorized to do so by the Vatican. And somehow, I cannot believe that Mons. Twal deliberately went out on his own to make the announcement without this prior authorization. Besides, Fr. Lombardi quickly quashed speculation about a possible cancellation when the new crisis erupted in Gaza last week - i.e., it continues to be a possibility.]

from

Dec. 17, 2008


Because it was released, as it usually is, a few weeks before the event, very few commentators commented on the Pope's Message for the World Day for Peace on the day itself. In fact, however, even the initial commentaries that appeared after it was first released were rather perfunctory.

Fr. Schall, as usual, takes the time to see the implications behind the Pope's words - in this case, his fresh approach to the question of poverty in the world which is not limited to simple do-goodism.

---

"We all share a single divine plan: we are called to form one family in which all — individuals, peoples and nations — model their behavior according to the principles of fraternity and responsibility."
— Benedict XVI, "Fighting Poverty to Build Peace," Message for 2009 World Day of Peace, December 8, 2008.

"Certainly we cannot 'build' the Kingdom of God by our own efforts —what we build will always be the kingdom of man with all the limitations proper to our human nature. The Kingdom of God is a gift, and precisely because of this, it is great and beautiful, and constitutes the response to our hope. And we cannot — to use the classical expression — 'merit' Heaven through our works. Heaven is always more than we could merit, just as being loved is never something 'merited,' but always a gift. However ... it will always be true that our behavior is not indifferent before God and therefore not indifferent to the unfolding of history."
— Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi, #35.

"The future Pope's 1985 paper insists that it is mere moralizing, not morality, to dismiss what economics has learned about the market mechanism. But economics cannot find a remedy for the imagination of an evil heart, or a foolish one, for that matter. Ethics founded on religion are the precondition for long-term economic success...."
— Spengler, "Benedict XVI Is Magnificently Right", Asia Times, December 9, 2008.

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I.

Benedict XVI's 2009 World Day of Peace Message is couched in military terms. "The end of war is peace," Aristotle used to say. Hobbes proposed solving potential war problems that arose out of conflicting ideas and religions by keeping the citizens busy in economic activities and threatening violent death to those who bothered about higher things.

But here, in the Pope's message, we are "fighting." "Fighting what?" we ask. We are "fighting," of all things, "poverty," which logically does not have too many arms. This is a very elusive target. Why are we "fighting poverty?" Evidently, to achieve "peace." "Is peace, then," we wonder, "dependent on riches?

The assumption here seems to be that poverty causes wars. Aristotle had said that some men steal because they are hungry. But the real danger comes from those pursuing pleasure or, even worse, those pursuing philosophy of sorts. Economics could deal with the first, but not with the latter two.

When we "solve" the problem of poverty, we do not solve the problem of war. It has other roots, more disturbing ones, in the human spirit. We, in fact, may make war more likely, if we are to believe Aristotle, if we unwisely change regimes. Most poor people are not war-like; not a few rich ones are.

In Plato's nomenclature, the economic classes and the military classes had different tasks. Indeed, the military classes arose out of excessive desire in which un-virtuous producers desired more and more of other people's goods.

The military was to protect what the economic classes had produced or to take what more they needed from neighbors, by fighting presumably. If one knows human nature, it is not likely that a minimum of civic peace is possible without police and army protecting the basic institutions from those who would destroy them.

Many of the worst regimes in history were allowed by those who did not want to admit that they had enemies.

In the Epilogue of A Guide for the Perplexed, E. F. Schumacher remarked that economics is a "solved" problem. We know how to solve the problem of poverty. We just have to apply what we know about markets, justice, innovation, exchange, production, laws, honesty, and profit.

The poverty problem, as we know it, is not really economic, but political. There are those in power in poor countries who will not do what it necessary and known to help. This is why knowing human nature is a prerequisite to knowing whether our knowledge of how to solve poverty issues will actually be allowed and will be used.

This latter political problem can never be solved once and for all. It will keep recurring because neither virtue nor knowledge is hereditary. Yet, in the contemporary world, the claim to "solve" poverty problems is almost the spiritual origin of all ideology which claims to have "the" solution if only we apply, by choice or by force, their formula to the social order.

The experience of the modern world, however, is that such ideology, under apparently good intentions, rapidly passes into tyranny, much to the mystification of those who would solve all our problems. Indeed, one of the substitutes for God in the modern world is a "vision" of eliminating poverty that is used as justification for dominance.

It has been the custom on January 1st of each year for the Roman Pontiff to issue a well-prepared message on the New Year, always directed to world peace. Within the general orbit of peace, various themes are taken up.

Christianity is perennially concerned with the poor. This concern, Nietzsche thought, was a sign of weakness; indeed he believed it fostered it. There is something paradoxical here. A rather fine line exists between being "concerned" with the poor and yet knowing little or nothing about how to make them not to be poor.

Many efforts designed to assist the poor only make them poorer, or, more often, dependent on a force that is all too dubious in intent. The history of political welfare movements makes a sober read in this regard.

In principle, nothing is wrong with being poor rather than rich. Aristotle wisely said that most folks need some property, some material goods, to practice virtue. When Christ said "the poor you always have with you," he was quite right.

Perceptions of poverty and actual poverty, moreover, are not the same. If my neighbor is worth, say, fifty million dollars and I am worth one hundred thousand, I see myself to be relatively poor. I may still have everything I really need and may not want to have more than I do. I know those who are poorer than I who may even envy what I have.

The poor, the rich, and all in-between, moreover, can save their souls. Indeed, some dispute arises about who is more likely to lose their soul, the poor or the rich. The general consensus is that it is the rich whose path in this vale of tears is the more salvifically troublesome.

Christianity came into the world to offer salvation to all, rich and poor, but its purpose was not to teach us economics or politics, though, indirectly, it might shed some light on both disciplines and practices. We could figure out economics and politics pretty much by ourselves, as Aristotle taught us.

II.

On first reading, Benedict XVI's latest message seems full of sociological jargon — "gaps," globalization, marginalization, development, human ecology, disarmament, solidarity, redistributionism. I did not see "consumerism," a term almost as variable as "rights" or "values." The term "right to life" is there.

I was prepared at first to write this document off as ghost written by some U. N. attached Vatican diplomat. Many an ideologue thinks we can solve the "global" problems if only we increase population control, restrict markets, impose rights everywhere, eliminate national sovereignty, and put everything under the world courts. All of this is the nightmare specter of a world state from which there is no escape. Of course, the Pope will have none of this.

Still, except for an occasional mention of "state," the message was almost devoid of any reference to politics. Politics is something that Benedict is usually quite perceptive about.

But as I read this document certain things began to stick out. This document is something of a sleeper. We read, in section two: "In so-called 'poor' societies, economic growth is often hampered by cultural impediments which lead to inefficient use of available resources." This was Schumacher's point.

Not infrequently, the resources, both human and natural, of poor societies are vast. What is lacking is both know-how and will, often virtue. Not infrequently religious or cultural practices skewer reasonable growth.

In this context then, Benedict adds that respect for the "transcendent dignity of the human person" is what indicates the basis of how to approach poverty. The Pope is not a multi-culturalist; this principle is addressed to every "culture" on the basis of reason.

This World Day of Peace Message pays very close attention to the demographic question. This issue, "over-population," is one of the great justifications of complete political and moral control over individual nations and all mankind.

Spengler, continuing his comment on Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger's 1985 lecture, writes:

---

Underlying the crisis is the Western world's repudiation of life, through a hedonism that puts consumption or "self-realization" ahead of child-rearing.

The developed world is shifting from a demographic profile in which the very young (children four years and under) outnumbered the elderly (65 and older), to a profile with 10 times as many retirees as children aged four or younger.

Economics simply never has had to confront a situation in which the next generation simply failed to turn up.

---

It can be argued that the coming problem is really 'under'— not 'over'—population. In this light, Pope Ratzinger in the World Peace Message ssimply points out matter-of-factly that poor people have made economic advances.

The extermination of millions of unborn children, in the name of the fight against poverty, actually constitutes the destruction of the poorest of all human beings.

And yet it remains the case that in 1981, around 40% of the world's population was below the threshold of absolute poverty, while today that percentage has been reduced by as much as a half, and whole peoples have escaped from poverty despite experiencing substantial demographic growth. This goes to show that resources to solve the problem of poverty do exist, even in the face of an increasing population (#3).

In other words, killing off a good percentage of the next generation is a formula for a rapidly aging population who must find needed labor outside its own society even for themselves to survive a little longer. In principle, economic growth and population are not at loggerheads. This is what my 1971 book Human Dignity & Human Numbers was about.

After speaking of child poverty, disarmament, the food crisis, and a common code of ethics, Benedict turns his attention to international commerce. He notes its rapid growth since the Second World War. He points out what seems obvious, that the primary path for poor countries to become richer is through their participation in trade.

He notes that poor countries are sometimes closed out of this trade through what are in effect political decisions. This issue not only has to do with trade but with capital and investment. We can suddenly see that any serious downturn in the world's economic system is not only a problem for the rich countries but for the poor ones.


III.

What comes next in this relatively brief (eight single-spaced pages) Message is remarkable. Ever since John XXIII's Pacem in Terris, (if not the writings of Leo XIII, Pius XI, and Pius XII), the need has been clear of a legal framework in which laws and reliable courts of justice made available the instruments by which commerce and production could operate. A good deal of the burdens on all economies, moreover, comes from crime.

The Pope notes this, though it deserves special and detailed treatment, as the example of the drug "trade" in all of Latin America and the world makes clear. It is ironic that one of the "growth" industries is the drug traffic with all its slaughter and corruption, before which even the most determined governments seem often helpless. This is true because the demand for such drugs comes from many, many people who do not discipline their own lives.

The Pope next says something very surprising. "It cannot be denied that policies which place too much emphasis on assistance underlie many of the failures in providing aid to poor countries" (#11). A statement like this comes very rarely from a religious leader.

Religion, especially Christianity, has almost a vested interest in "giving" aid without inquiring about the consequences of the aid given. Here we have a Pope telling us, paradoxically, that failures to aid to the poor come from aid.

The reason for this problem is that often outside aid, no matter how generously given, undermines local efforts and prices designed to develop local businesses. Like welfare, it conditions people to depend on someone else's help so that eventually no one can help himself or learn how to do so.

What is the right approach? "Investing in the formation of people and developing a specific and well-integrated culture of enterprise would seem at present to be the right approach in the medium and long term."

One of the lessons of modern economic growth is that almost anyone in the world can learn it if allowed and encouraged and taught to do so. Another lesson is that nations that once learned it can also forget or become too soft or corrupt to do the work necessary to sustain it.

For some time, it has been quite obvious, as Schumacher already said in 1977, that the economic problem is solved. So is the problem of making an automobile.

The lesson of the automobile, as we see every day, is that someone else can learn to do it better and cheaper than we can. In itself, this is a positive thing. We have no "right" to produce inferior things. We can respond by tariff and taxes to force our own people to buy more expensive and less well designed cars. But this avenue just means fostering inefficiency both for ourselves and for others.

The use of the phrase "medium and long term," in the Pope's sentence, means that it does take time to train and develop peoples through education and experience, but not that long.

IV.

The Pope's next point is even more unexpected. "If economic activities require a favorable context in order to develop, this must not distract attention from the need to generate revenue." That is, people need money.

But money is not just something given to us, but something earned. The best way to destroy a man is simply to give him money with no obligation on his part of producing something that earns it.

Catholic social thought has long insisted on the dignity of work, often, it seemed, for its own sake, as if what we produced with the work did not matter. But if I read Genesis correctly, the work by the sweat of our brow, in all its forms, was to be on things that we would not otherwise have unless we figured out a way to have them and then went to the trouble of producing and exchanging them.

The Pope continues with this theme: "While it has been rightly emphasized that increasing per capita income cannot be the ultimate goal of political and economic activity, it is still an important means of attaining the objective of the fight against hunger and absolute poverty."

We are also beings who have material needs that must be met in order that we come to be what we are intended to be. These basic needs are not in principle "selfish." They are simply an acknowledgement of what we are.

My own understanding of the economy is that economic growth, in which the total amounts of goods and services increases, is the best way to help the poor everywhere. It creates a demand for them to join the economy where they are not "cared for" or "given" what they need, but where they "earn" their living.

Too many people think they are doing what they ought by "giving" to the poor, rather than by making it possible for the poor to provide for themselves. Know-how, no doubt, is a better form of gift.

The first way, as the Pope implied, often crushes the poor and makes them utterly dependent. The real problem of modern economies is not, as it is often said, even by the Popes, the "increasing gap between rich and poor," but the failure of the whole economy coherently to grow.

One of the principal causes of this growth is a constant stream of new life into the world. This is something, interestingly, that both Locke and Rousseau understood. There will always be changes in the actual persons who are rich, poor, or middle class.

But if we took all the riches from the rich (something tax laws sometimes seem bent on doing) and distribute it to the poor, the net effect would be to make everyone poor. It would kill any incentive whereby the things we need are produced and distributed by those who invent or develop ways to do it.

The Pope quite clearly recognizes what is at stake. We have heard a lot of this "redistribution" solution posed of late. This is what Benedict says: "The illusion that a policy of mere redistribution of existing wealth can definitively resolve the problem (of poverty) must be set aside." (See my essay, "Redistributionism", First Principles Journal, November 10, 2008).

The point is that "existing wealth" is not enough. What is needed is not a static concept of an unchanging pie, but one of a growing amount. We are to "increase and multiply" precisely so that we will develop ourselves and the world in the process.

Benedict has it right: "In a modern economy, the value of assets is utterly dependent on the capacity to generate revenue in the present and the future. Wealth creation therefore becomes an inescapable duty, which must be kept in mind if the fight against material poverty is to be effective in the long term."

The lessons of the current recession seem to suggest that it is the neglect of actual growth in a context of work and not speculation for its own sake that is the problem.

We hear a lot about greed and excessive profits, but too little about those ideas and patents and inventions that actually improve human existence by providing ways for everyone to participate in the economy.

The true wealth of the world is not in things, but in the mind of man that knows and in the enterprise of man that goes to the effort to make something happen and to the polities of man that provide a context of law and exchange wherein these things can happen.

If there is any priority to the poor, it is that priority that enables them not to be poor. If we do not know what this latter means, we will not help the poor in spite of our good will or political ideologies.

"Good development policies depend for their effectiveness on responsible implementation by human agents and on the creation of positive partnership between markets, civil society and States" (#12).

It is in the "civil society," not the state apparatus, where most of the really innovative and human exchanges take place, which the background of the state makes possible.

Benedict also provides another caution, which both surprised and delighted me. The term "globalization," which the Pope himself uses, has itself become a kind of ill-defined buzz word that can mean almost anything from totalitarian control of the world through ecology or politics to a sort of fascination with the inter-connectedness of things on this small planet that somehow holds so many of us.

Benedict cites John Paul II, who had already said that the term globalization is "notably ambivalent." Benedict adds that the term must be used with "great prudence" (#13).

At this point, the Pope returns to the more spiritual issues that poverty brings up.

"We often consider only the superficial and instrumental causes of poverty without attending to those harbored within the human heart, like greed and narrow vision. The problems of development, aid and international cooperation are sometimes addressed without any real attention to the human element, but as merely technical questions —limited, that is, to establishing structures, setting up trade agreements and allocating funding impersonally."

Much modern social thought seems to maintain, in the heritage of Rousseau, that structures are the whole problem. Aristotle had it right, as did Plato. Structures are important, but the real problems initiate in the human heart.

The Pope finally returns to a theme that is found in the last part of Deus Caritas Est: "What the fight against poverty really needs are men and women who live in a profoundly fraternal way and are able to accompany individuals, families and communities on journeys of authentic human development."

One of the unique things about Benedict is the attention he pays to the inadequacy of bureaucracy and the need of personal attention. This is generally not something that government can supply and one of the additions that Christian revelation teaches politics in its own order.

V.

In the beginning of these reflections I cited a passage from Spe Salvi to the effect that the Kingdom of God is not something that we can build by ourselves, as our ideology insists on thinking. It is initially a gift.

Modern political and social theories want to reject this "gift" nature of our destiny as alienating. They seek to accomplish the end of final happiness, the Aristotelian heritage, by human efforts in this world.

As the Pope spells out in this same Encyclical, this inner-worldly definition of happiness is a terrible destiny, a lowering of our sights, and an exclusion of our true destiny beyond this world. But we live in this world and work out our salvation here.

The issue of poverty always makes visible to us both the enormous resources in our minds and in our world that are available to us if we would both learn to use them properly and will to sacrifice ourselves to do so.

This world is an abundant place, remarkably so. That it has seven billion minds working within it and on it to keep us in dignity while we are here is the other side of the material abundance, which needs us so that it fulfill its own destiny.

The Pope's 2009 World Day of Peace Message "fights" poverty by explaining to us, not its horrors, nor its inevitability. Rather, Benedict is interested in what is available for us to make the lives of most people livable through their own efforts to do something worthwhile for themselves and others.

But when all the economic side of poverty considered, such a thing as "spiritual" poverty still exists. This is something Mother Teresa spoke of, as does Benedict. The very poorest are those who lack not goods, but who lack God.

Aristotle had already pointed out that the polity at its best was ordained to leisure, which in turn was concerned with those higher questions of what it is we are and what we are about. It is concerned with our origins, our meaning, with death, and hope.

Once poverty has been "fought," to use Benedict's term, then what? This quandary is why he talks of a "journey to ultimate human development."

Plato had it right, really. Economics only brings us to the threshold of the human — and the human city, in its turn, only brings us to the city in speech.

It was Augustine who brought us finally to the "City of God" But it was also Augustine who told us that the effect of revelation was not just a kind of waiting till the end, but an active help of our neighbors, all of whom have the same ultimate destiny, rich or poor, intelligent or simple.

"Economics cannot find a remedy for the imagination of an evil heart, or of a foolish one, for that matter." Not all our problems are economic ones. Indeed, the greatest ones are, as Aristotle said, in the minds of the philosophers who seek to construct their own world apart from what is and impose it on the rest of us.

At bottom, in this Message, Benedict shows that he knows a good bit about economics. But in other writings, by far the greater part of his work, that he knows of metaphysics and theology, of what goes on the heart of man.

He knows what God has sent into the world to deal with it in its faults and to lead it to its divine destiny. This latter too, as he shows in his book, Jesus of Nazareth, has something to do with our lot, even our economic lot, in this world, and beyond it.

January 4
The Epiphany of our Lord*
Feast of Mother Elizabeth Seton


*The feast is celebrated today in many churches who have made it a moveable feast, but it is traditionally celebrated on January 6,
the twelfth day after Christmas, and that is how the Vatican celebrates it. Thus, the Holy Father will celebrate Mass for
the Feast of the Epiphany on Tuesday, January 6, at St. Peter's Basilica.


OR today.


The only papal news other than Rinunce e Nomine is the Apostolic Letter naming Cardinal Bertone to represent
the Pope at the VI World Encounter of Families in Mexico City (reported yesterday). Top Page 1 stories are
the Gaza fighting and a new terrorist massacre in Iraq. The Taize community's Brother Alois writes the guest
commentary on 'An experience of communion' referring to the recent Taize youth gathering in Brussels. The inside
pages have a couple of interesting stories about Christmas - the role of Pope Gregory the Great in establishing it
as a primary christian holiday, and recent discoveries in Sicily of cave paintings about the Three Kings
decorating children's tombs (photo). Lastly, there is an excellent interview on the state of inter-religious
dialog with Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, which I hope to find time to translate later today.



THE POPE'S DAY
Angelus today.

ANGELUS TODAY





At the noontime Angelus today, the Holy Father cited the Prologue to the Gospel of John as a 'vertiginous synthesis of Christian faith' which is worth meditating on for the true significance of the Nativity of Christ.

After the prayers, he called on the faithful to join the Christian Churches in the Holy Land today in offering special prayers for peace, in the light of the worsening conflict in the Gaza Strip.

He said to pray that the Baby Jesus may inspire Israeli and Palestinian leaders to put an immediate end to the hostilities.

In English, he said:

---

In these first days of the New Year, as the Church celebrates the birth of the Saviour, let us pray that the peace proclaimed by the angels at Bethlehem will take ever deeper root in human hearts, banish all discord and violence, and inspire the human family to live in harmony and solidarity. Upon you and your loved ones I invoke the Lord’s abundant blessings!

---

THE HOLY FATHER'S WORDS

Here is a full translation:

---

Dear brothers and sisters,

The liturgy today re-proposes for our meditation the same Gospel proclaimed on the Feast of the Nativity, namely, the Prologue to St. John's Gospel.

After the clamor of the preceding days with the race to acquire gifts, the Church invites us to contemplate anew the mystery of the Nativity of Christ, in order to grasp its profound significance and importance for our life.

It is a wonderful text which offers a vertiginous synthesis of the entire Christian faith. It starts from a height: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (Jn 1,1).

Then comes the unheard-of and humanly inconceivable news: "And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us" (Jn 1,14a). Not as a rhetorical figure but as an experience that had been lived! Conveyed to us by John, an eyewitness: "And we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father's only Son, full of grace and truth" (Jn 1,14b).

These were not the learned words of a rabbi or a doctor of the law, but the passionate testimony of a humble fisherman who, attracted as a youth to Jesus of Nazareth, in three years of a shared life with him and with the other apostles, experienced love - so much as to describe himself as 'the disciple whom Jesus loved". He saw him die on the Cross and appear resurrected, and then with the others, received his Spirit.

From all this experience, meditated in his heart, John drew an intimate certainty: Jesus is the Wisdom of God incarnate. He is the eternal Word who made himself a mortal man.

For a true Israelite, who knows Holy Scriptures, this was not a contradiction, but rather the fulfillment of the entire Old Testament: In Jesus Christ is the fullness of the mystery of a God who speaks to men as to friends, who revealed himself to Moses in the Law, to the sages and the prophets.

Knowing Jesus, being with him, listening to his preaching, and seeing the signs he worked, the disciples came to recognize that all Scripture was realized in him.

As a Christian author would affirm later: "All of divine Scripture constitutes a single book, and this unique book is Christ - it speaks of Christ and finds its fulfillment in Christ" (Ugo di San Vittore, De arca Noe, 2, 8).

Every man and every woman needs to find a profound sense for his own existence, and for this, books do not suffice, not even the Sacred Scriptures alone.

The Baby of Bethlehem reveals and communicates to us the true 'face' of the good and faithful Lord who loves us and never abandons us even in death.

"No one has ever seen God. The only Son, who is God and who is at the Father's side, has revealed him" (Jn 1,16).

The first to open her heart and to contemplate 'the Word made flesh' was Mary, the mother of Jesus. A humble girl from Galilee thus became the 'Seat of Wisdom'.

Like the apostle John, each of us is invited to 'take her into our home' (cfr Jn 19,27) in order to know Jesus more profoundly and to experience his faithful and inexhaustible love.

This is my wish for each of you, dear brothers and sisters, at the start of this new year.


After the prayers, he said:

The Patriarchs and the Heads of the Christian Churches in Jerusalem today, in all the Churches of the Holy Land, invite the faithful to pray for an end to the conflict in the Gaza Strip and to implore for justice and peace in their land.

I join them in this and I ask you to do the same, remembering, as they tell us, "the victims, the injured, those whose hearts are broken, who live in anguish and fear, so that God may bless them with comfort, patient and peace that come from him".

The tragic news which comes to us from Gaza show how the rejection of dialog leads to situations which weigh unspeakably on populations that are once again the victims of hatred and war.

Hatred and war are not solutions to problems. Even more recent history confirms this.

Let us pray, then that "the Baby in the manger... may inspire the authorities and responsible officials on both sides, Israeli and Palestinian, to immediate action that will put an end to the present tragedy."

I am glad to greet the participants in the international congress on "Don Bosco's preventive system and human rights" organized by the Salesians. This is a very important subject because the educative aspect is very decisive even in the field of human rights. I therefore wish you profitable work and assure you of my prayers.

I also welcome with joy the many seminarians who have come from different countries for a formative encounter by the Focolari movement. Dear young people, I bless your path with all my heart. May the Virgin Mary watch over you always.

---

Pope Benedict calls
for end to Gaza bloodshed




Rome, jAN. 4 (DPA) - Pope Benedict XVI Sunday called for an end to the fighting in the Gaza Strip, as Israeli troops continued their ground offensive.

The head of the Catholic Church urged the thousands of believers who had gathered at St Peter's Square in the Vatican for Sunday Angelus to pray together with the patriarchs and members of the Christian Churches in Jerusalem for "justice and peace for the Holy Land."

"The dramatic news that reaches us from Gaza shows that the refusal of dialogue ... has resulted in an indescribable worsening of the conditions for the population ... who are once again victims of hate and war," the Pontiff said.

Benedict said that "war and hate aren't the solution" to problems in the Middle East.


Pope urges Israel, Hamas
to 'act immediately' on Gaza



VATICAN CITY, Jan. 4 (AFP) – Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday called on Israeli and Palestinian leaders to "act immediately to end the current tragic situation" in the Gaza Strip.

The Pontiff deplored the "refusal to dialogue" which has resulted in an "indescribable worsening" of conditions through ground fighting for the coastal strip's population, "once again the victims of hatred and war".

At least 23 Palestinians, the majority of them civilians, have been killed in Gaza since Israel's ground offensive in the Hamas-run enclave began on Saturday, medics said on Sunday.

In total, more than 485 Palestinians have died, including 80 children, with more than 2,500 wounded according to Gaza medics since Israeli military operations began on December 27.

Rocket fire from Gaza over the past week has killed four people in Israel.

The Vatican has yet to confirm that the Pope will visit Israel, reportedly set for May 8-15.

Benedict added after Sunday Angelus prayers that: "War and hatred are not solutions to problems.

"Today, in all the churches of the Holy Land," Church leaders are "calling on worshippers to pray for the end to the conflict in the Gaza Strip and (for) justice and peace for their land," the Pope also said.

"I join in their prayers and invite you to do the same."

In his New Year's and World Peace Day message on Thursday, the Pope warned that "violence, hatred and mistrust are themselves forms of poverty -- perhaps the greatest -- that must be fought.

"The deep desire to live in peace... rises in the hearts of the great majority of the Israeli and Palestinian peoples, once more placed in danger by the massive violence that has broken out in the Gaza Strip in response to other violence.

"May this not prevail," the Pope urged, having called last Sunday on the international community to help both sides abandon "this dead-end road."

Israel unleashed a massive bombardment of Hamas targets in Gaza on December 27 in response to [persistent daily barrages of] militant rocket and mortar fire into southern Israel, home to some 850,000 Israelis.

Just a little over a year ago, the year opened with a monumental media to-do in Italy when the rector of La Sapienza University gave in to a protest by 67 physics professors (out of a faculty of more than 4000), supported by a few hundred radical leftist students, to downgrade an invitation to Pope Benedict XVI to formally inaugurate the academic year at the University, by making his planned address simply one among three others to be delivered on that occasion.


THE ARROGANCE OF BIGOTS: Signs read, "The Pope can go anywhere, except to La Sapienza!" (left);
and right, "To the Pope - Perhaps you have not understood. We don't want you!'"

The agitation by the dissenters, who had mobilized radical labor union members all over Italy to come to Rome and demonstrate against the Pope on the occasion, led the Vatican - on the advice of the Italian Ministry of the Interior - to decide against the Pope's participation in the event, in order to avoid any possible rioting and injury to demonstrators, bystanders and policemen, although it sent on to the university the text of the address he had planned to deliver. It is one of the great 'secular' texts of his Pontificate so far.

Last week, La Sapienza came back into the headlines when it was revealed that Valerio Morucci, a former member of the terrorist Red Brigade (which kidnapped and killed Italian Premier Aldo Moro in 1978, to cap a series of terrorist bombings in city centers and train stations) was to deliver a lecture at the university (on 'Culture, history and memory'), at the invitation of a professor of Anglo-American literature.

Morucci took direct part in the kidnapping of Moro, during which five persons, including the Prime Minister's police escort, were killed. Morucci later claimed he was against murdering Moro. He was sentenced to multiple verdicts of life imprisonment in 1979, but because of providing information to the police about Brigade operations, the sentence was shortened, and was eventually commuted in 1994. He now makes a living as a computer expert, and has written books about his experiences in the Red Brigade.

After outraged protests from many politicians and other academics at the absurdity of a former terrorist - some used the term 'assassin' - addressing a university that had, in effect, turned down the Pope last year, the present rector finally decided to prohibit the lecture.



'La Sapienza' awaits
the Pope - again

But will his bigoted academic critics raise new objections?

by CARLO PICOZZA
Translated from

January 4, 2008


Luigi Frati, rector of La Sapienza University, says he directly handed over to Pope Benedict XVI an invitation to come to the university at the right occasion.



He said this took place at the Pope's annual pre-Christmas meeting with teachers and students of the Roman universities at St. Peter's Basilica on December 11.

Frati said that the Pope had asked him for a copy of the greeting that he delivered on behalf of the university officials before the pope's address to the assembly. In the greeting, Frati had said that the university still awaits a visit from the Pope.

Frati says that two days later, he received "a sign of attention from the Vatican spokesman, Fr. Federico Lombardi, who gave him some type of assurance that the invitation would be considered, something that is unique more than rare for Fr. Lombardi."

In short, does he think the Pope will come to La Sapienza?

"I really think so," Frati said. "It would be unreasonable to turn down an invitation to come to the university at an appropriate occasion."

However, Frati claims that the invitation last year for the Pope to attend the inauguration of the academic year was inopportune. [It was the 705th anniversary of La Sapienza, which was founded by Pope Boniface VIII in 1303, but became Rome's first state university in 1870 after Italian reunification. With 145,000 students, it is Europe's largest university.]

Equally 'inopportune', according to Frati, "was the position of 67 colleagues who signed the letter against the Pope's coming to the university, not as an expression of legitimate secularity, but for the judgments they expressed about the Pope's thinking". ['Inopportune' is hardly the right adjective - it was simply 'wrong', because they were using patently false information to make their argument!]

"The university should be an open place: its task is the dissemination of scientific knowledge and culture. With one rule: that those who present such teachings should be persons who have studied, researched and published about their respective subjects."

[So, in what way would the Pope's speaking at La Sapienza have been inopportune? The subject he chose was the role of the university, for which a distinguished 25-year academic career as a university professor more than qualifies him. Frati's explanation below is, to say the least, specious and unworthy.]

"Last year, some professors wrote the rector at the time to say that it was inopportune to have invited the Pope to deliver the opening address [Italian has a specific term for an opening address, 'prolusione'] for the academic year. [The dissenters' protest was far more than that, of course, primarily impugning Joseph Ratzinger's thinking - and that of the Church - as obscurantist and anti-scientific.]

"It was not meant to be a 'prolusione' at all, but an address after the inauguration.He was never invited to deliver the 'prolusione' and there will never be one for that purpose. But there was an invitation to come to La Sapienza, and there will always be. In unequivocal manner," Frati explained.

[Frati is not only splitting hairs; he is contradicting facts as reported then. All the media reports in December 2007, when the invitation was first made, referred to the Pope inaugurating the academic year at La Sapienza.

After the professors' dissent was publicized, the then-rector modified the Pope's participation to a 'co-starring' role, so to speak, sharing the stage with the Mayor of Rome as an adjunct speaker, after the actual 'prolusione' was given by a Sapienza professor. I think it is rather ungracious, if not downright rude, of Frati to take this stand now!]

Frati located on his computer the text of the greeting he delivered at St. Peter's, of which he gave the Pope a copy. It said, among other things:

"I confess not to have understood - as a researcher, first, than as a believer - the prejudice which moved those who in January 2008 referred to the Galileo case to object to your visit to La Sapienza. As rector, in my 'prolusione' to the current academic year, I said that we still await your visit - an invitation that on this occasion we address to you once more, as a refined scholar of philosophy, but also to you as the Bishop of this city."


On second thought, isn't the 'invitation' Frati made a generic one? It is for the university to specify the occasion on which they want the Pope to come, not for the Pope to tell them! A generic invitation without specifying an occasion is a token expiatory gesture, not an invitation.

January 5

Memorial of St. John Neumann, Bishop


No OR today.

No events scheduled for the Holy Father.

The Vatican announced a press briefing tomorrow by Cardinal Ennio Antonelli, president of the Pontifical Council
for the Family, on the VI World Encounter of Families to take place in Mexico City on January 13-18.

Among today's RINUNCE E NOMINE, the Holy Father has accepted the canonical resignation of Cardinal Adam Maida
as Archbishop of Detroit (Michigan) and named Mons. Allen Henry Vigneron, Bishop of Oakland, to succeed him.

January 6

Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord


OR for 1/5-1/6/09:

At the Sunday Angelus, Benedict XVI calls for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza:
'War and hatred do not resolve problems'

Other Page 1 stories: International diplomacy mobilizes to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza, as the Arab League
criticizes the UN for 'ignoring the siege of Gaza' (three other stories on that conflict in the inside pages);
and an essay on the Orthodox celebration of the Epiphany as a celebration of the Holy Trinity.



THE POPE'S DAY
Mass of the Epiphany at St. Peter's Basilica

Feastday Angelus

Giotto, Adoration of the Magi, 1320. Tempera on panel, 45x44 cm.
Originally part of an altarpiece in the Church of Santa Croce, Florence. Now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.



MASS OF THE EPIPHANY

At 10 a.m. today, the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord, the Holy Father Benedict XVI celebrated Holy Mass at St. Peter's Basilica.






Here is a translation of the Holy Father's splendid homily today:

---

THE HOLY FATHER'S HOMILY

Dear brothers and sisters!

The Epiphany - the 'manifestation' of our Lord Jesus Christ - is a multiform mystery.


GIOTTO. The Adoration of the Magi; the Baptism of Jesus; and the Marriage at Cana. 1305-1310. Frescoes, Capella Scrovegni, Padua.

Latin tradition identifies it with the visit of the Magi to the Baby Jesus in Bethlehem, and therefore interpreted it above all as the revelation of Israel's Messiah to pagan peoples.

Oriental tradition, instead, prefers to identify it with the baptism of Jesus on the river Jordan, when he manifested himself as the only-begotten Son of the heavenly Father, consecrated by the Holy Spirit.

But the Gospel of John asks us to consider even the marriage of Cana as an epiphany, when Jesus, changing water into wine, "revealed his glory, and his disciples began to believe in him" (Jn 2,11).

What should we say, dear brothers, especially we who are priests of the new Covenant, who are daily witnesses and ministers of the 'epiphany' of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist?

In this most holy and most humble sacrament - which reveals and hides his glory at the same time - the Church celebrates all the mysteries of the Lord. "Adoro te devote, latens Deitas" – thus, in adoration, we pray along with St. Thomas Aquinas.

In this year, 2009, which is specially dedicated to astronomy, on the 4th centenary of Galileo Galilei's first observations on the telescope, we cannot fail to pay attention to the symbol of the star, so important in the Gospel account of the Magi (cfr Mt 2,1-12).

In all likelihood, they were astronomers. From their observatories, in the east relative to Palestine, probably in Mesopotamia, they noted the appearance of a new star, and interpreted this celestial phenomenon as the announcement of the birth of a new king, specifically, according to Sacred Scriptures, the king of the Jews (cfr Nm 24,17).

The Fathers of the Church also saw in this singular episode narrated by St. Matthew a sort of cosmological 'revolution' caused by the entry into the world of the Son of God.

For example, St. John Chrysostom writes; "When the star came over the baby, it stopped, and this could be done only by a power that stars do not have: first, to hide itself, then to appear as a new star, and finally to stop" (Homily on the Gospel of Matthew, 7, 3).

St. Gregory Nazianzene states that the birth of Christ 'imposed new orbits on the stars' (cfr Poemi dogmatici, V, 53-64: PG 37, 428-429). Which is clearly to be understood in the symbolic and theological sense.

In effect, while pagan theology divinized the elements and the forces of the cosmos, the Christian faith, bringing Biblical revelation to fulfillment, contemplates one God, Creator and Lord of the entire universe.

It is divine love, incarnated in Christ, that is the fundamental and universal law of Creation. And this must be understood not in a poetic sense, but in a real sense.

That, too, was what Dante meant, when, in the sublime verse that concludes the Paradise section and the entire Divine Comedy, he defines God as "the love that moves the sun and other stars" (Paradise, XXIII, 145).

This means that the stars, the planets, the entire universe, are not governed by a blind force, they do not obey the dynamics of bare matter alone. Therefore, it is not the cosmic elements that must be divinized, but on the contrary, in everything and above everything, there is a personal will, the Spirit of God, which in Christ is revealed as Love (cfr Enc. Spe salvi, 2).

If this is so, then men - as St. Paul writes to the Colossians - are not slaves of the 'cosmic elements' (cfr Col 2,8), but are free, capable of relating themselves to the creative freedom of God.

God is at the origin of everything, and governs everything, not as a cold, anonymous motor, but as Father, Spouse, Friend, Brother, as Logos, 'Word-Reason', who has united himself to our mortal flesh once and for all time and fully shared our condition, manifesting the super-abundant power of his grace.

There is thus in Christianity a particular cosmological conception which found its highest expression in medieval philosophy and theology. Even in our time, this concept shows interesting signs of a new flowering, thanks to the passion and faith of not a few scientists who, in the footsteps of Galileo, renounce neither reason nor faith but value both to the utmost in their reciprocal fecundity.

Christian thought compares the cosmos to a 'book' - even Galileo said so - considering it as the work of an Author who expresses himself through the 'symphony' of Creation. Within this symphony, one finds, at a certain point, that which one would call in musical language a 'solo' [assolo in Italian], a theme entrusted to one instrument or to one voice, which is so important that the significance of the entire work depends on it.

This 'assolo' is Jesus, to whom a regal sign corresponds: the appearance of a new star in the firmament. Jesus was compared by the early Christian authors to a new sun. According to present astrophysical knowledge, we should compare him to a star that is even more central, not only for our solar system, but for the entire known universe.

In this mysterious design, which is both physical and metaphysical, which led to the appearance of the human being as the crowning element of creation, Jesus came to the world: 'born of woman' (Gal 4,4), as St. Paul writes.

The Son of man assumes into himself heaven and earth, Creation and Creator, flesh and the Spirit. He is the center of the cosmos and of history, because in him are united without confusion the Author and his work.

The earthly Jesus was the peak of creation and history, but the risen Christ goes beyond: the passage, through death, to eternal life anticipates the 'recapitulation' of everything in Christ (cfr Eph 1,10).

Indeed, the Apostle writes, "all things were created through him and for him" (Col 1,16). And precisely through his resurrection from the dead, he became 'preeminent in all things" (Col, 1,18).

Jesus himself affirms this, appearing to his disciples after the resurrection: "All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me" (Mt 28,18).

This knowledge sustains the pilgrimage of the Church, Body of Christ, along the paths of history. There is no shadow, however dark, that can obscure the light of Christ.

That is why, for those who believe in Christ, hope never fades, even today, in the face of the great social and economic crises which afflict mankind; in the face of hatred and destructive violence which do not cease to cause bloodshed in many regions of the earth; in the face of the selfishness of man and his pretension of setting himself up as his own god, which can lead to dangerous distortion of the divine design of life and human dignity, of family and the harmony of creation.

Our efforts to free our life and the world from the poisons and contaminations that could destroy the present and the future have value and sense - as I noted in the aforementioned encyclical Spe salvi- even if we apparently are not succeeding or appear to be impotent against overwhelming hostile forces, because our great hope is "based upon God's promises that give us courage and direct our action in good times and bad" (No. 35).

The universal Lordship of Christ is exercised in a special way over the Church. "And he put all things beneath his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way" (Eph 1,22-23).

Epiphany is the manifestation of the Lord, and by reflection, it is the manifestation of the Church, because the Body cannot be separated from the Head.

The first Reading today, taken from the so-called Third Isaiah, offers us the precise perspective for understanding the reality of the Church as a mystery of reflected light: "Rise up in splendor!", the prophet says, addressing Jerusalem, "Your light has come, the glory of the Lord shines upon you" (Is 60,1).

The Church is mankind enlightened, 'baptized' in the glory of God, that is, in his love, in his beauty, in his lordship. The Church knows that mankind itself, with its limitations and its miseries, brings to relief the work of the Holy Spirit.

She cannot boast of anything except her Lord: the light does not come from her, the glory is not hers. But her very joy that no one can take away is this: to be the 'sign and instrument' of him who is 'lumen gentium', light of the people (cfr Conc. Vat. II, Cost. dogm. Lumen gentium, 1).

Dear friends, in this Pauline Year, the Feast of the Epiphany invites the Church, and in her, every community and every single faithful, to imitate - as the Apostle of the Gentiles did - the service which the star rendered to the Magi from the East, leading them to Jesus (cfr St. Leo the Great, Disc. 3 per l’Epifania, 5: PL 54, 244).

What was Paul's life, after his conversion, if not a 'race' to bring to the peoples [of the known world] the light of Christ, and vice versa, to lead the peoples to Christ?

The grace of God made Paul into a 'star' to lead people. His ministry is an example and a stimulus for the Church to rediscover herself as essentially missionary, and to renew her commitment to proclaim the Gospel, especially to those who do not know it yet.

But, looking at St. Paul, we cannot forget that all his preaching was nourished by Sacred Scriptures. Therefore, in the light of the recent General Assembly of the Bishops' Synod, it must be reaffirmed forcefully that the Church and individual Christians can be a light that leads to Christ only if they nourish themselves assiduously and intimately in the Word of God.

It is the Word which enlightens, purifies, converts - not us, certainly. We are nothing but servants of the Word of life. That is how Paul thought of himself and his ministry: a service to the Gospel. "All this I do for the sake of the gospel, so that I too may have a share in it" (1 Cor 9,23)

And so should the Church, every ecclesial community, every bishop and every priest, be able to say: I will do everything for the Gospel.

Dear brothers and sisters, pray for us, the pastors of the Church, so that, by assimilating daily the Word of God, we can transmit it faithfully to our brothers. We too, pray for you, the faithful, because every Christian is called to Baptism and Confirmation in order to announce Christ, the light of the world, in words and with the testimony of his life.

May the Virgin Mary, Star of Evangelization, help us to fulfill this mission together, and may St. Paul, Apostle of the Gentiles, intercede for us in heaven. Amen.

---

Thanks to Caterina for the prompt video-cap montages (also of the Angelus).

NB: As pre-announced by Mons. Guido Marini, the Pope wore a Roman chasuble today that had been made for Paul VI. But equally noticeable was
the papal chair used, bearing the arms of Pius IX. I believe it is the first time it has been used by Benedict XVI.





Also, at today's weekday Angelus, for the second time on such an occasion, the Holy Father wore a mozzetta and choir robe, instead of his regular papal cassock (see post below). He first did this for the New Year's Day Angelus.

ANGELUS TODAY


Thanks to Lella for capturing this livecam shot of Piazza San Pietro and Via della Conciliazione at the Angelus today.



In his mini-homily before the noonday Angelus prayers today, the Holy Father, he described the Feast of the Epiphany as the 'revelation' of Christ.

He referred to the passage in Matthew's account of the Three Kings in today's Gospel, when Herod hears from them about a 'newborn king of the Jews' - "He was greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him", saying "Jerusalem is us, if we close ourselves to the mystery of the true God."

After the prayers, he greeted the Oriental Churches who, following the Julian calendar, will celebrate the Feast of the Nativity tomorrow. In this connection, he reiterated his Sunday message about the conflict in Gaza, praising the 'peace makers' who are trying to obtain a ceasefire.

He noted that today's feast, also a celebration of the Three Kings, is a festival for children in many countries. He recalled that the Church marks on this day the Day of Child Missionaries and spoke about the children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo who have been kidnapped in recent months by armed bands, calling on their raptors to return them to their families.

In English, he said:

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On this feast of the Epiphany, the Church celebrates the revelation of Christ, the Eternal Son of the Father, as the light of the nations and the Saviour of all mankind.

May the radiance of the Lord’s glory fill you and your families with deep spiritual joy, and draw men and women everywhere to faith and new life in him!

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Here is a full translation of the Holy Father's words:

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Today we celebrate the solemnity of the Epiphany, the 'manifestation' of the Lord. The Gospel narrates how Jesus came to the world in great humility and hiddenness.

St. Matthew nonetheless cites the episode of the Magi who came from the east, led by a star, in order to render homage to the newborn King of the Jews.

Every time we listen to this story, we are struck by the sharp contrast between the attitude of the Magi, on the one hand, and of Herod and the Jews, on the other.

In fact, the Gospel says that upon hearing the words of the Magi, King Herod 'was greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him" (Mt 2,3). A reaction that can have different interpretations: Herod is alarmed, because he sees in him whom the Magi seek a rival for himself and for his children. The chiefs and residents of Jerusalem, on the other hand, seemed more stunned than anything else, as if they had been awakened from a certain torpor and needed to reflect.

Isaiah had, in fact, pre-announced: "For a child is born to us, a son is given us; upon his shoulder dominion rests. They name him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace" (Is 9,5).

Why then was Jerusalem upset? It seems that the Evangelist wished almost to anticipate what would be the attitude of the High Priests and the Sanhedrin, but even of the people, regarding Jesus during his public life.

Certainly, it makes evident that knowledge of Scriptures and of the Messianic prophecies do not bring everyone to open up to Him and his word. We recall that just before his Passion, Jesus wept over Jerusalem because it did not 'recognize the time of its visitation' (cfr Lk 19,44).

This is one of the crucial points in the theology of history: the drama of God's faithful love in the person of Jesus who "came to what was his own, but his own people did not accept him" (Jn 1,11).

In the light of the whole Bible, this attitude of hostility, or ambiguity, or superficiality, represents that of every man and of 'the world' - in a spiritual sense - when they close themselves off from the mystery of the true God, who comes to us in the disarming gentleness of love.

Jesus, the 'king of the Jews' (cfr Jn 18,37), is the God of mercy and faith. He wants to reign in love and in truth, and asks us to convert ourselves, to abandon bad deeds and to decisively take the way of goodness. In this sense, then, 'Jerusalem' is all of us.

May the Virgin Mary, who accepted Jesus in faith, help us not to close our hearts to the Gospel of salvation. Rather, let us allow ourselves to be conquered and transformed by him, Emmanuel, God who has come among us to make us a gift of his peace and his love.


After the Angelus, he said this:

I address my fervent wishes to our brothers and sisters in the Oriental Churches, who, following the Julian calendar, will celebrate the Holy Nativity tomorrow. May the memory of the Savior's birth kindle ever more in their hearts the joy of being loved by God.

Remembering our brothers in the faith leads me in spirit to the Holy Land and the Middle East. I continue to follow with great apprehension the violent armed encounters taking place in the Gaza Strip. While I repeat that hatred and the rejection of dialog can only lead to war, I wish today to encourage the initiatives and efforts of those who, having peace at heart, are seeking to make Israelis and Palestinians agree to sit down and talk. May God support the commitment of these courageous 'makers of the peace'.

The Feast of the Epiphany, in many countries, is also the feast of children. Therefore, my thoughts go to all children, who are the wealth and blessing of the world, but especially to the many who are denied a peaceful childhood.

I wish, in particular, to call attention to the dozens of children and youths who, in the past months, including the Christmas season, have been kidnapped by armed bands who attack villages, causing numerous deaths and injuries, in the eastern province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

I appeal to those responsible for such inhuman brutalities to return these children to their families and to a future of security and growth, to which they have a right along with the beloved peoples of that region.

I also express my spiritual nearness to the local Churches, including those that have been directly struck in their personnel and in their work, even as I exhort the Pastors and the faithful to be strong and firm in hope.

The episodes of violence against children, which unfortunately also take place in other parts of the world, appear even more deprecable considering that 2009 is the 20th anniversary of the international Convention on Children's Rights.

This is a commitment that the international community is called on to renew in order to defend, protect and promote the children of the world.

May the Lord help those - and they are innumerable - who work daily in the service of the new generations, helping them to be protagonists for their own future.

Besides, the Day of Missionary Children, which the Church celebrates today on the Feast of the Epiphany, is a timely occasion for demonstrating how children and young people can play an important role in spreading the Gospel and in brotherly works to their more needy contemporaries. May the Lord reward them!

To the Italians, he said:

I also greet those who are taking part in the pageant-procession "Viva la Befana', inspired this year by the folklore of the city and region of Assisi.

'Befana'* comes from 'Epiphany'. and therefore, I greet all the children of Rome on this feast, as well as the adults, that they may retain the spirit of childhood. Best wishes to all!

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*La Befana, in Italian folklore, is the old woman who brings gifts to children on Twelfth Night (Epiphany being the 12th day after Christmas), as well as lumps of coal for the undeserving.



Again, Caterina beats the news agencies at posting the photos.



Once again, one must shake one's head in bewilderment at what the news agencies chose to take from the Pope's Angelus message above, reducing his citation from Spe salvi to literal 'pollution' rather than a metaphor for the world's ills - as if the Pope's message were only newsworthy if he says something topical, i.e., a 'green' message :


Pope: Pollution could destroy world's future



VATICAN CITY, Jan. 6 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI is warning that pollution in the world could destroy our present and our future.

But his message in an Epiphany Day homily Tuesday in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City is that people should not lose heart in tackling the challenge.

Benedict is encouraging what he calls people's efforts to liberate human life and the world from "poisons and pollution." He says even though such efforts against "hostile forces" might not seem successful, Christian hope gives courage and guidance.

In his homily the Pope also urged people to be hopeful during the global economic crisis. Benedict denounced the bloodshed in conflicts in many regions of the world, but named no countries.

January 7
Saint Raymond of Penafort,
Priest of the Order of Preachers


No OR today (because yesterday was a religious holiday).


THE POPE'S DAY
First General Audience for 2009 - The Holy Father resumed his catechetical cycle on St. Paul,
speaking about the Christian worship that he preached.

GENERAL AUDIENCE TODAY

The Holy Father held his first General Audience for 2009 today, resuming his catechetical cycle on St. Paul. He spoke about the apostle's preaching on Christian worship.

He synthesized the lesson in English as follows:

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At the beginning of this New Year, I offer all of you my cordial good wishes! In the coming months, may our minds and hearts be opened ever more fully to Christ, following the example of Saint Paul, whose life and doctrine we have been considering during this Pauline Year.

Today we turn to the meaning of "true worship" as highlighted in Paul’s Letter to the Romans. In uniting us to himself, Christ, a temple "not made with human hands", has made us a "living sacrifice". Paul thus exhorts us to offer our own "bodies" – meaning our entire selves – as a "spiritual worship": not in the abstract, but in our concrete daily life.

At the same time, this true worship does not come about merely through human effort. Rather, through baptism, we have become "one in Christ Jesus" (Gal 3:28), who took upon himself our human nature and has thus "assumed" us into himself. Only he has the power, by joining us to his body, to unite all people.

Thus, the goal of the Church’s missionary activity is to call everyone into this "cosmic liturgy", in which the world becomes the glory of God: "a pleasing sacrifice, sanctified by the Holy Spirit".

Upon you and your families I willingly invoke God’s blessings of joy and peace throughout the new year!

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THE HOLY FATHER'S CATECHESIS
#17 in the Pauline Cycle

Dear brothers and sisters,

At this first General Audience of 2009, I wish to express to all my fervent best wishes for the year that has just begun. Let us revive in ourselves the commitment to open up our mind and heart to Christ, in order to be and to live as true friends with him.

May his company make this year, even with its inevitable difficulties, a journey full of joy and peace. Indeed, only if we remain united with Jesus can the new year be good and happy.

The commitment of union with Christ is the example that St. Paul offers us. Continuing with the catecheses dedicated to him, we will dwell today on one of the important aspects of his thought - that regarding the worship that Christians are called on to exercise.

In the past, much was made about an anti-worship tendency in the Apostle, of his 'spiritualization' of the idea of worship. Now we understand better that Paul sees in the Cross of Christ a historical turning point which transforms and radically renews the reality of worship.

Above all, there are three texts from the Letter to the Romans referring to his new vision of worship.

1. In Romans 3,25, after writing of the 'redemption realized by Jesus Christ', Paul continues with a formulation that seems mysterious to us: "(Jesus was) set forth as an instrument of expiation, through faith, by his blood".

With this expression which sounds strange to us - 'instrument of expiation' - St. Paul is referring to the so-called 'propitiatory' of the ancient (Jewish) temple, which is the lid of the Ark of the Covenant, believed to be the point of contact between God and man, the point of his mysterious presence in the world of men.

This 'propitiatory', on the great day of reconciliation, Yom Kippur, was sprinkled with the blood of sacrificial animals, blood which symbolically brought the sins of the past year into contact with God, thus casting these sins into the abyss of divine goodness, and as though absorbed by the power of God, overcome and forgiven. Life could start anew.

St. Paul refers to this rite and says: This rite was an expression of the desire that we can truly put all of our sins into the abyss of divine mercy and thus make them disappear. But this cannot be realized with the blood of animals. It requires a more real contact between human sin and divine love.

This contact took place on the Cross of Christ. Christ, Son of the true God, who became true man, took upon himself all our sins. He himself is the point of contact between human misery and divine mercy - in his heart, the sad mass of all the evil done by mankind is dissolved, and life is renewed.

In pointing out to this change, St. Paul tells us: The Cross of Christ - the supreme act of divine love which has become human love - put an end to the old cult with sacrificial animals in the temple of Jerusalem.

That symbolic worship, a worship of desire, has now been replaced by true worship: God's love incarnated in Christ is brought to fulfillment in his death on the Cross.

Therefore, this is not a spiritualization of real worship, but on the contrary, it is real worship itself, true divine-human love replacing a symbolic and provisional worship.

The Cross of Christ, his flesh-and-blood love, is the true worship, which corresponds to the reality of God and man. For Paul, even before the physical destruction of the temple [of Jerusalem], the time of the temple and its worship was over.

Paul is here in perfect consonance with the words of Jesus, who had announced the end of the temple and announced another temple 'not made by the hands of man' - the temple of his resurrected body (cfr Mk 14,58; Jn 2,19ff).

2. The second passage I wish to discuss today is found in the first verse of Chapter 12 of the Letter to the Romans. We heard it earlier [at the brief Scripture reading that precedes the catechesis] and I repeat it: "I urge you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, your spiritual worship".

These words contain an apparent paradox: while sacrifice normally demands the death of the victim, Paul talks about it instead in relation to the life of the Christian. The expression "offer your bodies", as the concept of sacrifice, takes on the ritual nuance of "giving oneself in oblation, in offering".

The exhortation to 'offer your bodies' refers to the entire person; indeed, in Romans 6,13, he says "present yourselves (to God). Moreover, the explicit reference to the physical dimension of man coincides with the invitation to "glorify God in your body" (1 Cor 6,20). It means, therefore, to honor God more concretely in our daily existence, with its relational and perceptible visibility.

Such behavior is described by Paul as "a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God". It is here that we encounter the word 'sacrifice'. In the usage of that time, this term had a sacred context to indicate the ritual slaughter of an animal, of which part is burned in honor of the gods and the rest consumed by the offerers in a banquet.

Paul applies it instead to the life of the Christian. In fact, he describes such a sacrifice using three adjectives. First - 'living' - which expresses vitality. The second - 'holy' - recalls the Pauline idea of holiness linked not to places and objects but to the person of the Christian himself. The third - 'pleasing to God' - perhaps recalls the frequent Biblical expression of sacrifice "a sweet-smelling oblation" (cfr Lev 1,13.17; 23,18; 26,31; etc.).

Soon afterwards, Paul defines this new way of living: this, he says, is "your spiritual worship". The commentators on the text know that the Greek expression (tçn logikçn latreían)is not easy to translate.
The Latin Bible translates it as 'rationabile obsequium'. The same word 'rationabile' is found in the first Eucharistic Prayer, the Roman Canon, in which one prays that God may accept the offering [of the Mass] as 'rationabile'.

The usual Italian translation into 'spiritual worship' does not reflect all the nuances of the Greek expression (nor of the Latin). In any case, it does not mean a worship that is any less real, or simply metaphorical, but a more concrete and realistic act of worship - worship in which man himself in his totality as a being endowed with reason, becomes adoration and glorification of the living God.

This Pauline formula, which returns in the Eucharistic Prayer of the Roman Missal, is the fruit of the long development of religious experience in the centuries before Christ. In this experience, we meet theological developments of the Old Testament and currents of Greek thought. I would like to point out some elements of this development.

The Prophets and many Psalms strongly criticize the bloody sacrifices in the temple. For example, Psalm 50[49], in which God says: "Were I hungry, I would not tell you, for mine is the world and all that fills it. Do I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats? Offer praise as your sacrifice to God; fulfill your vows to the Most High" (12-14).

In the same sense, the following Psalm 51[50] says: "...A burnt offering you would not accept. My sacrifice, God, is a broken spirit; God, do not spurn a broken, humbled heart" (18f).

In the Book of Daniel, at the time of the second destruction of the temple by the Hellenistic regime (second century BC), we find a new step in the same direction. In the midst of fire - namely, persecution and suffering - Azariah prays: "We have in our day no prince, prophet, or leader, no holocaust, sacrifice, oblation, or incense, no place to offer first fruits, to find favor with you. But with contrite heart and humble spirit let us be received, as though it were holocausts of rams and bullocks... So let our sacrifice be in your presence today" (Dan 3,38ff).

With the destruction of the temple and of the ritual act, deprived of every sign of the presence of God, the believer offers as the true holocaust his contrite heart - his desire of God.

We see an important and beautiful development, but with a danger. There is a spiritualization, a moralization, of worship: worship becomes only a thing of the heart, of the spirit. The body is missing, the community is missing.

Thus we understand that Psalm 51 and even the Book of Daniel, despite their criticism of ritual acts, desire a return to the time of sacrifices. But to a time of renewal, to a renewed sacrifice, in a synthesis that then was not foreseeable, that then was even unthinkable.

To get back to St. Paul. He was the heir of these developments, of the desire for true worship, in which man himself becomes the glory of God, a living adoration with his whole being. It is in this sense that he tells the Romans: "...Offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, your spiritual worship" (Rm 12,1).

Thus Paul repeats what he already indicated in Chapter 3: the time of the sacrifice of animals - a sacrifice by substitution - is over. The time for ture worship has come.

But here, too, there is the danger of misunderstanding: One could easily interpret this new worship in a moralistic sense - that by offering our life, we perform true worship. But this would substitute moralism for animal worship, in that man could do everything by himself by sheer moral effort. This was certainly not St. Paul's intention.

The question remains: How must we interpret this 'spiritual, rational worship'? Paul always supposes that we have become 'one in Christ Jesus' (Gal 3,28), that we died in baptism (cfr Rm 1) and now we live with Christ, for Christ, in Christ.

In this union - and only thus - we can become, in him and with him, 'a living sacrifice' and offer 'true worship'. The sacrificed animals were meant as a substitute for man, man's gift of himself, but they could not.

Jesus Christ, in giving himself to the Father and to us, is not a substitute, but truly carries humanity in himself, our sins and our desires. He truly represents us, he assumed us into himself.

In the communion with Christ, realized in faith and in the sacraments, we become, despite all our inadequacies, a living sacrifice; and thus, we achieve 'true worship'.

This synthesis is the basis for the Roman Canon in which we pray that the offering may become 'rationabile' - that spiritual worship may be realized. The Church knows that in the Holy Eucharist, Christ's self-giving, his true sacrifice, becomes present.

But the Church prays that the community that makes the offering is truly united with Christ, truly transformed. She prays so that we ourselves can become what we cannot be by our own powers: an offering that is 'rationabile' and pleasing to God.

Thus, the Eucharistic Prayer interprets the words of St. Paul correctly. St. Augustine clarified all this in a wonderful manner in the 10th book of his City of God. I will cite only two sentences:

"This is the sacrifice of Christians: although we are many, we are one body in Christ" ... "The entire community (civitas) that has been redeemed - namely, the congregation and the society of saints - is an offering to God through the High Priest who gave himself" (10,6: CCL 47, 27 ss).

3. Finally, a brief word on the third text from the Letter to the Romans about the new worship. St. Paul says in Chapter 15: "...the grace given me by God to be a minister [liturgo] of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, in performing the priestly service [hierourgein] of the gospel of God, so that the offering up of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the holy Spirit" (15,15ff).

I wish to underscore just two aspects of this marvellous text which is unique in the Pauline letters for its terminology. Above all, St. Paul interprets his missionary activity among the peoples of the world as a priestly activity.

To announce the Gospel in order to unite peoples in communion with the risen Christ is a 'priestly' action. The Apostle of the gospel is a true priest,doing what is the center of priesthood: preparing the true sacrifice.

Then the second aspect: the object of missionary activity is, we might say, cosmic liturgy: that peoples united in Christ, the world, become as such the glory of God, "an offering that is acceptable and sanctified by the Holy Spirit".

Here we see the dynamic aspect, the aspect of hope in the Pauline concept of worship: Christ's self-giving implies the tendency to attract everyone to communion with his Body, to unite the world. Only in communion with Christ, the exemplary Man, one with God, can the world become what we all desire: a mirror of divine love.

This dynamism is always present in the Eucharist - this dynamism that should inspire and form our lives. Let us start the new year with this dynamism. Thank you for your patience.

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Pope Benedict jokes about hoarse voice



VATICAN CITY, Jan. 7 (AP) - A hoarse Pope Benedict XVI asked the faithful during a general audience Wednesday to bear with his weak voice.

The thousands who packed into the Vatican's Paul VI Hall for the Pope's first weekly audience of the year cheered and applauded when he joked that "unfortunately I have no voice but I hope I will be able to make myself understood."

The Pope thanked them for their "patience."

A Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Ciro Benedettini, said Benedict's health was fine and that his voice had been affected by Rome's cold and damp weather.

Benedict kept a busy schedule over the Christmas period, leading several ceremonies and giving blessings.


[If you listen to the catechesis,
media01.vatiradio.va/podcast/00144795.MP3
one hears a 'deep-voiced' Benedict XVI!]

Posted earlier today in the preceding page:
The Holy Father's first General Audience of 2009 - He talks about St. Paul's concept of divine worship.





St John's gospel unquestioningly
an 'eyewitness account' says Pope
by Richard Owen in Rome

January 6, 2009


'Unquestioningly'? I think the editor/headline writer meant 'unquestionably'! [The reporter gets it right; his editor flubs it!] Can't we even trust the Times of London to use English right? In any case, Richard Owen managed to turn up a polemical angle from the Pope's homily at the Mass for the Epiphany yesterday here, setting the Pope against the scholars this time.



Taking aim at scholars who doubt St John's Gospel as confirming the "historical reality" of Jesus, Pope Benedict XVI has declared that it is unquestionably an "eyewitness account".

The Pope said St John's Gospel was "the passionate testimony" of a man who as a young, humble fisherman had been attracted to Jesus, had loved him as a disciple, had shared his experiences at first hand for three years, and had seen Him die on the Cross and then rise again.

"From this experience, which he meditated in his heart, John drew an intimate certainty - that Jesus was the Knowledge of God incarnate" the Pope said during a recent Angelus address. [No, Sir! Not at Angelus. At Mass. To think this only happened yesterday! If a reporter is careless about the little obvious facts, will he be more scrupulous about bigger, more important facts that require close attention and verification?]

Gianni Gennari, an Italian theologian, said that whereas St Mark had learned much of Jesus's life and teachings from St Peter, St Luke was believed to have been given details by the Virgin Mary after Jesus's death and St Matthew had "put Jesus's parables and speeches in chronological order" with the skill of a former tax collector, St John was "different".

"He reflected on his experiences for years, and then put his personal memories together with a series of doctrinal statements on the relationship between Jesus and the Holy Spirit and on Jesus as the Word Incarnate", says Gennari [He is an ex-priest who married but has reconciled with the Church and has been writing a media-watch column and editorials for Avvenire.]

He said no one doubted the existence of figures such as Alexander the Great or Aristotle even though the first accounts of them appeared long after their deaths. By contrast the first known papyruses referring to Jesus dated to the end of the first century.

St John described himself arriving at Jesus's tomb before St Peter because he was younger and could run faster (20:1-6), and included other vivid details which could only have come from his own experience.

He had also described settings since confirmed as authentic by archeologists, such as the Pool of Bethesda, a rectangular pool uncovered in the nineteeth century near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem with five porches or covered colonnades, where Jesus healed a lame man and told him "Take up thy bed and walk" (John 5:2-9).

Professor Gennari said John included details which Jesus shared only with the disciples, including his farewell speeches, as well as miracles not found in the Synoptics, such as raising Lazarus from the dead.

It is commonly held by supporters of St John's Gospel as a first-hand account that he is referring to himself when he repeatedly describes "the disciple whom Jesus loved".

However, beginning at the end of the nineteeth century, sceptics have suggested that inconsistencies and non sequiturs indicate the Gospel was put together by various authors, and is not a reliable source for Jesus's life and ministry. [Which doesn't make the account of events any less true! It just means other persons had an input into it, especially if, apparently, the 'inconsistencies and non sequiturs' do not alter the substance of the events recounted!]

La Stampa said the Pope was also responding to recent best-selling books on "the historical Jesus" written by the Italian author Corrado Augias with two Biblical scholars, Remo Cacitti of Milan University and Mauro Pesce of Bologna University.




Meanwhile, still at the Times: Either the editors and reporters don't keep track of the stories they've already reported, or this second report on the same subject in less than 5 days (with little that is new except the malice) is actually a deliberate exercise in Schadenfreude - what amounts to a journalistic jig of gleeful gloating at the 'shrinking' attendance at Benedict XVI's public events. Richard Owen wrote about it on 12/31 - see Benefan's post in the previous page.

Or maybe their pretext is that the Sunday Times is a different newspaper from the weekday Times.


Crowds shrink for ‘bland’ Benedict,
the Pope who only ever says No

BY John Follain in Rome
January 4, 2009


THE crowds turning out for Pope Benedict XVI’s preachings and blessings at the Vatican are dwindling fast as the dour pontiff pays the price for his lack of charisma and visibility compared with John Paul II, his showman predecessor.

Figures from the Vatican show the number of pilgrims attending Benedict’s weekly audiences, mainly in a vast auditorium by St Peter’s Basilica, and his Sunday Angelus in St Peter’s Square where he speaks from his study window, shrank from 2.8m in 2007 to 2.2m in 2008.

This is a far cry from the 4m people who came to the Vatican or the papal summer residence of Castel Gandolfo in the first year after his 2005 election, when the novelty factor drew crowds bigger than in the final years of John Paul. The figures are expected to drop further as the economic downturn hits global travel.

Before his election as leader of 1 billion Catholics, Joseph Ratzinger, the German cardinal and theologian, had been branded “God’s rottweiler” and “the Panzerkardinal” because of his work as an enforcer of doctrine.

His personality was contrasted with John Paul, known as “the Grand Communicator” because of his media-friendly skills.

Visitors to the Vatican often pay tribute to John Paul. They shuffle past his tomb in the crypt of St Peter’s Basilica and postcards bearing his image still sell well.

Vito Mancuso, a theologian critical of Benedict, linked the smaller crowds to the worldwide fall in priestly vocations and decline in church attendance. He advised Benedict, 81, to stop “saying always and only ‘no’ ”. The Church needs to be more humble and doubtful about its rulings on the role of women, sexuality and bioethics, he said.

In the latest “no”, the Vatican on New Year’s Day stopped automatically adopting Italian laws because of potential “antiCatholic legislation” involving euthanasia and gay marriage. In an address to Vatican staff, Benedict said homosexuality threatened humanity as much as did rainforest destruction. {GRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! Enough already! There should be a hell at hand for all lying journalists.]

“Benedict’s papacy has in the long run a polarising impact inside the Catholic world. In one camp there are those who are enthusiastic about Ratzinger’s government; in the other camp are those who aren’t attracted by it,” said Marco Politi, a Vatican watcher.

Benedict’s appeal appeared strongest on his trips abroad last year; journeys to France, Australia and the United States were successful despite controversy over paedophile priests.

George Weigel, John Paul’s biographer, said the numbers going to the Vatican were still impressive.

“Can you imagine any other public figure in the world to whom millions of people freely come for instruction and inspiration? What’s most striking about the pilgrims at papal audiences under Benedict XVI is how carefully they listen to him; he’s a master teacher,” he said.

John Allen of the National Catholic Reporter, an American weekly, said Benedict was still drawing bigger crowds than John Paul at a comparable point in his pontificate but his appeal was limited to “Catholic insiders”. [Mr. Allen must met some members of this Forum who are not even Catholics. I can't believe he can be so short-sighted.]

“Last year Benedict drew nothing like the saturation coverage in the global press that surrounded John Paul at a similar stage of his papacy. [At a similar stage in his Papacy, John Paul II was the victim of an attempted assassination, the first ever against a Pope and he could have died from it. What could be better fodder for the media? Whereas Benedict is the continuing target of character assassination by the media. There's the big difference!] Benedict is a distinctly less interesting figure than John Paul for the outside world,” he said.

Benedict is unlikely to lose sleep over the dwindling crowds. “I don’t think he’ll tear his hair out. The Pope isn’t a celebrity. His problem is the clarity of his teaching – not how many listen, but how many remember the message,” said Rocco Buttiglione, a Christian Democrat politician and a friend of Benedict.

Benedict told Vatican staff he did not want to be a “star” around whom everything revolved, but “only and completely” the vicar of Christ.

Vittorio Messori, co-author of bestselling books with both John Paul and Benedict, dismissed the dwindling crowds as insignificant. “The Pope represents Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ isn’t subject to popularity rankings. In fact, the more a Pope ‘pleases’, the less likely he’ll be an authentic icon of Christ,” he said.

January 8
St. Lawrence Justinian, Bishop


OR for 1/7-1/8/09:

At the General Audience, Benedict XVI resumes catecheses on St. Paul:
'Time of true worship has come'
The issue also features the Holy Father's homily for the Mass of the Epiphany and his Angelus message afterwards. .

Page 1 has an update on the Gaza conflict, with Israel announcing a 3-hour ceasefire daily to allow humanitarian aid to get in.



THE POPE'S DAY
Address to the diplomatic corps - Traditional New Year's reception.
The Pope spoke in French, but the text has been released in all the official languages.

THE POPE'S NEW YEAR ADDRESS
TO THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS
ACCREDITED TO THE VATICAN


The Holy Father met with the ambassadors accredited to the Holy See at the Sala Regia (Throne Room) of the Apostolic Palace
this morning for the traditonal New Year reception. The Vatican curently has diplomatic relations with 177 states.




The new dean of the Vatican Diplomatic Corps delivers the greeting in behalf of his colleagues.



Here is the official English text of the address delivered by the Holy Father to the Vatican diplomatic corps.

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Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

The mystery of the incarnation of the Word, which we re-live each year on the Solemnity of Christmas, invites us to reflect on the events marking the course of history.

And it is precisely in the light of this hope-filled mystery that this traditional meeting takes place with you, the distinguished members of the diplomatic Corps accredited to the Holy See – a meeting which, at the beginning of this new year, offers us a fitting occasion to exchange cordial good wishes.

I express my gratitude to His Excellency Ambassador Alejandro Valladares Lanza for the good wishes he has kindly offered me, for the first time as Dean of the Diplomatic Corps. My respectful greeting also goes to each of you, along with your families and staff, and, through you, to the peoples and governments of the countries which you represent. For everyone I ask God to grant the gift of a year rich in justice, serenity and peace.

At the dawn of this year 2009, I think with affection of all those who have suffered – whether as a result of grave natural catastrophes, particularly in Vietnam, Myanmar, China and the Philippines, in Central America and the Caribbean, and in Columbia and Brazil; or as a result of violent national or regional conflicts; or again as a result of terrorist attacks which have sown death and destruction in countries like Afghanistan, India, Pakistan and Algeria.

Despite so many efforts, the peace we so desire still remains distant! Faced with this reality, we must not grow discouraged or lessen our commitment to a culture of authentic peace, but rather redouble our efforts on behalf of security and development.

In this regard, the Holy See wished to be among the first to sign and ratify the "Convention on Cluster Munitions", a document which also has the aim of reaffirming international humanitarian law.

On the other hand, while noting with concern the signs of crisis appearing in the area of disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation, the Holy See has continued to reaffirm that peace cannot be built when military expenses divert enormous human and material resources from projects for development, especially the development of the poorest peoples.

It is towards the poor, the all too many poor people on our planet, that I would like to turn my attention today, taking up my Message for the World Day of Peace, devoted this year to the theme: "Fighting Poverty To Build Peace".

The insightful analysis of Pope Paul VI in the Encyclical Populorum Progressio has lost none of its timeliness: "Today we see people trying to secure a sure food supply, cures for disease, and steady employment. We see them trying to eliminate every ill, to remove every obstacle which offends man’s dignity. They are constantly striving to exercise greater personal responsibility; to do more, to learn more and to have more, in order to be more. And yet, at the same time, so many people continue to live in conditions which frustrate these legitimate desires" (No. 6).

To build peace, we need to give new hope to the poor.

How can we not think of so many individuals and families hard pressed by the difficulties and uncertainties which the current financial and economic crisis has provoked on a global scale?

How can we not mention the food crisis and global warming, which make it even more difficult for those living in some of the poorest parts of the planet to have access to nutrition and water?

There is an urgent need to adopt an effective strategy to fight hunger and to promote local agricultural development, all the more so since the number of the poor is increasing even within the rich countries.

In this perspective, I am pleased that the recent Doha Conference on financing development identified some helpful criteria for directing the governance of the economic system and helping those who are most in need.

On a deeper level, bolstering the economy demands rebuilding confidence. This goal will only be reached by implementing an ethics based on the innate dignity of the human person. I know how demanding this will be, yet it is not a utopia!



Today more than in the past, our future is at stake, as well as the fate of our planet and its inhabitants, especially the younger generation which is inheriting a severely compromised economic system and social fabric.

Ladies and Gentlemen, if we wish to combat poverty, we must invest first and foremost in the young, setting before them an ideal of authentic fraternity.

During my apostolic visits in the past year, I was able to meet many young people, especially in the extraordinary context of the celebration of the Twenty-third World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia.

My apostolic journeys, beginning with my visit to the United States, also allowed me to assess the expectations of many sectors of society with regard to the Catholic Church.

In this sensitive phase of the history of humanity, marked by uncertainties and questioning, many people expect the Church to exercise clearly and courageously her mission of evangelization and her work of human promotion.

It was in this context that I gave my address at the headquarters of the United Nations Organization: sixty years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I wished to stress that this document is founded on the dignity of the human person, which in turn is based on our shared human nature, which transcends our different cultures.

A few months later, during my pilgrimage to Lourdes for the hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the appearances of the Virgin Mary to Saint Bernadette, I sought to emphasize that the message of conversion and love which radiates from the grotto of Massabielle remains most timely, as a constant invitation to build our own lives and the relations between the world’s peoples on the foundation of authentic respect and fraternity, in the awareness that this fraternity presupposes that all men and women have a common Father, God the Creator.

Moreover, a society which is "secular" in a healthy way does not ignore the spiritual dimension and its values, since religion – and I thought it helpful to repeat this during my pastoral visit to France – is not an obstacle but rather a solid foundation for the building of a more just and free society.

Acts of discrimination and the very grave attacks directed at thousands of Christians in this past year show to what extent it is not merely material poverty, but also moral poverty, which damages peace. Such abuses, in fact, are rooted in moral poverty.

As a way of reaffirming the lofty contribution which religions can make to the struggle against poverty and the building of peace, I would like to repeat in this assembly, which symbolically represents all the nations of the world, that Christianity is a religion of freedom and peace, and it stands at the service of the true good of humanity.

To our brothers and sisters who are victims of violence, especially in Iraq and in India, I renew the assurance of my paternal affection.

To the civil and political authorities, I urgently request that they be actively committed to ending intolerance and acts of harassment directed against Christians, to repairing the damage which has been done, particularly to the places of worship and properties, and to encouraging by every means possible due respect for all religions, outlawing all forms of hatred and contempt.

I also express my hope that, in the Western world, prejudice or hostility against Christians will not be cultivated simply because, on certain questions, their voice causes disquiet.

For their part, may the disciples of Christ, in the face of such adversity, not lose heart: witness to the Gospel is always a "sign of contradiction" vis-à-vis "the spirit of the world"!

If the trials and tribulations are painful, the constant presence of Christ is a powerful source of strength. Christ’s Gospel is a saving message meant for all; that is why it cannot be confined to the private sphere, but must be proclaimed from the rooftops, to the ends of the earth.

The birth of Christ in the lowly stable of Bethlehem leads us naturally to think of the situation in the Middle East and, in the first place, in the Holy Land, where, in these days, we have witnessed a renewed outbreak of violence provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian population.

This situation further complicates the quest for a settlement of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, something fervently desired by many of them and by the whole world.

Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned.

I express my hope that, with the decisive commitment of the international community, the ceasefire in the Gaza strip will be re-established – an indispensable condition for restoring acceptable living conditions to the population –, and that negotiations for peace will resume, with the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms.

It is very important that, in view of the crucial elections which will involve many of the inhabitants of the region in coming months, leaders will emerge who can decisively carry forward this process and guide their people towards the difficult yet indispensable reconciliation.

This cannot be reached without the adoption of a global approach to the problems of these countries, with respect for the legitimate aspirations and interests of all parties.

In addition to renewed efforts aimed at the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which I have just mentioned, wholehearted support must be given to dialogue between Israel and Syria and, in Lebanon, to the current strengthening of institutions; this will be all the more effective if it is carried out in a spirit of unity.

To the Iraqis, who are preparing again to take full control of their future, I offer a particular word of encouragement to turn the page and to look forward in order to rebuild without discrimination on the basis of race, ethnic group or religion.

As far as Iran is concerned, tireless efforts must be made to seek a negotiated solution to the controversy concerning the nation’s nuclear programme, through a mechanism capable of satisfying the legitimate demands of the country and of the international community. This would greatly favour détente in the region and in the world.

Looking to the great continent of Asia, I note with concern that, while in certain countries acts of violence continue, and in others the political situation remains tense, some progress has been made, enabling us to look to the future with greater confidence.

I think for example of the new negotiations for peace in Mindanao, in the Philippines, and the new direction being taken in relations between Beijing and Taipei. In this same context of the quest for peace, a definitive solution of the ongoing conflict in Sri Lanka would also have to be political, since the humanitarian needs of the peoples concerned must continue to receive ongoing attention.

The Christian communities living in Asia are often numerically small, yet they wish to contribute in a convincing and effective way to the common good, stability and progress of their countries, as they bear witness to the primacy of God which sets up a healthy order of values and grants a freedom more powerful than acts of injustice. The recent beatification, in Japan, of 188 martyrs brought this eloquently to mind.

The Church, as has often been said, does not demand privileges, but the full application of the principle of religious freedom. In this perspective, it is important that, in central Asia, legislation concerning religious communities guarantee the full exercise of this fundamental right, in respect for international norms.

In a few months, I will have the joy of meeting many of our brothers and sisters in the faith and in our common humanity who dwell in Africa. In anticipation of this visit, which I have so greatly desired, I ask the Lord to open their hearts to welcome the Gospel and to live it consistently, building peace by fighting moral and material poverty.

A very particular concern must be shown for children: twenty years after the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, they remain very vulnerable. Many children have the tragic experience of being refugees and displaced persons in Somalia, Darfur and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

There are waves of migration involving millions of persons in need of humanitarian assistance and who above all have been deprived of their elementary rights and offended in their dignity.



I ask political leaders on the national and international levels to take every measure necessary to resolve the current conflicts and to put an end to the injustices which caused them.

I express my hope that in Somalia the restoration of the State will finally make progress, in order to end the interminable sufferings of the inhabitants of that country.

In Zimbabwe, likewise, the situation remains critical and considerable humanitarian assistance is needed.

The peace agreement in Burundi has brought a glimmer of hope to the region. I ask that it be applied fully, and thus become a source of inspiration for other countries which have not yet found the path of reconciliation.

The Holy See, as you know, follows with special attention the continent of Africa and is pleased to have established diplomatic relations with Botswana in the past year.

In this vast panorama embracing the whole world, I wish likewise to dwell for a moment on Latin America. There too, people desire to live in peace, liberated from poverty and able freely to exercise their fundamental rights.

In this context, the needs of emigrants need to be taken into consideration by legislation which would make it easier to reunite families, reconciling the legitimate requirements of security with those of inviolable respect for the person.

I would also like to praise the overriding commitment shown by some governments towards re-establishing the rule of law and waging an uncompromising battle against the drug trade and political corruption.

I am pleased that, thirty years after the start of the papal mediation between Argentina and Chile concerning their dispute over the southern territories, those two countries have in some way sealed their desire for peace by raising a monument to my venerable predecessor, Pope John Paul II.

I hope, moreover, that the recent signing of the Agreement between the Holy See and Brazil will facilitate the free exercise of the Church’s mission of evangelization and further strengthen her cooperation with the civil institutions for an integral human development.

For five centuries the Church has accompanied the peoples of Latin America, sharing their hopes and their concerns. Her Pastors know that, to favour the authentic progress of society, their proper task is to enlighten consciences and to form lay men and women capable of engaging responsibly in temporal affairs, at the service of the common good.

Turning lastly to the nations which are nearer at hand, I wish to greet the Christian community of Turkey, while recalling that, during this special Holy Year marking the two-thousandth anniversary of the birth of the Apostle Paul, numerous pilgrims are making their way to Tarsus, his native city, a fact which once more indicates how closely this land is linked to the origins of Christianity.

The hope of peace is alive in Cyprus, where negotiations for a just solution to problems associated with the division of the Island have resumed.

As for the Caucasus, I wish to affirm once more that the conflicts involving the states of the Region cannot be settled by recourse to arms; and, in thinking of Georgia, I express my hope that all the commitments subscribed to in the ceasefire of last August – an agreement concluded thanks to the diplomatic efforts of the European Union – will be honoured, and that the return of the displaced to their homes will be provided for as quickly as possible.

Finally, with regard to the Southeast of Europe, the Holy See pursues its commitment to stability in the region, and hopes that conditions will continue to be created for a future of reconciliation and of peace between the populations of Serbia and Kosovo, with respect for minorities and commitment to the preservation of the priceless Christian artistic and cultural patrimony which constitutes a treasure for all humanity.

Ladies and Gentlemen, at the conclusion of this overview which, due to its brevity, cannot mention all the situations of suffering and poverty close to my heart, I return to my Message for the celebration of this year’s World Day of Peace. There I recalled that the poorest human beings are unborn children (No. 3).

But I cannot fail to mention, in conclusion, others who are poor, like the infirm, the elderly left to themselves, broken families and those lacking points of reference.

Poverty is fought if humanity becomes more fraternal as a result of shared values and ideals, founded on the dignity of the person, on freedom joined to responsibility, on the effective recognition of the place of God in the life of man.

In this perspective, let us fix our gaze on Jesus, the lowly infant lying in the manger. Because he is the Son of God, he tells us that fraternal solidarity between all men and women is the royal road to fighting poverty and to building peace.

May the light of his love illumine all government leaders and all humanity! May that light guide us throughout this year which has now begun! I wish all of you a happy New Year.

---

BOTSWANA IS THE 177TH NATION
TO ESTABLISH TIES WITH THE HOLY SEE
Translated from

January 8, 2009


On November 4, 2008. the Holy See established displomatic relations with the Republic of Botswana - at the level of an Apostolic Nunciature on the part of the Holy See, and an Embassy on the part of Botswana.

There are now 177 states who have full diplomatic relations with the Holy See.

In addition,it also has relations with the European Community as an organization and with the Sovereign Order of Malta, and with two missions of a special character: that of the Russian Federation, which is led by an Ambassador; and an office of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). [Strange that the relations are with an organization such as the PLO, rather than with the Palestinian Authority which is the government of the putative Palestinian state.]

As far as international orgganizations, the Holy See is an 'observer state' at the United Nations, as well as a member of 7 organizations or agencies within the UN system, an observer in 8 others, and a member or observer in 5 regional organizations.

In 2008, the Holy See signed an agreement with the Principality of Andorra which regulates the following areas: the position of the Bishop of Urgell, the juridical status of the Catholic Church in Andorra, canonical marriage, religious instruction in schools, and the Church's economic system in Andorra. The two states exchanged the Instruments of Ratification at the Vatican on December 12.

On May 29, the Holy See also exchanged Instruments of Ratification wit the Republic of the Philippines on an agreement signed in April 2007 regarding the cultural assets of the Catholic Church in the Philippines. [For example, the 17th- and 18th-century colonial churches built by the Spaniards in northern Philippines have been declared a UNESCO world cultural heritage.]

On November 13, the Holy See signed an agreement with Brazil regulating the status of the Catholic Church in the country, recognition of degrees granted by Cath9olic schools, canonical marriage and the Church's fiscal regime.

Finally, on December 18, the Holy See signed an agreement with France on the mutual recognition of degrees and diplomas granted by their respective institutions of higher learning.

Pope to send two messages
to World Meeting of Families



Mexico City, Jan 7, 2009 (CNA)- The organizing committee of the Sixth World Meeting of Families which will open in Mexico City on January 14 announced that Pope Benedict XVI will send two messages to the participants of this historic event.

Organizers aid the Holy Father will send his first message which will be read at the beginning of the Meeting, and his second will be sent live via satellite during the closing Mass on January 18.

“Everything is almost ready to welcome the almost 30 cardinals and 200 bishops who will come from all parts of the world and have confirmed their attendance,” officials added.

The World Meeting of Families can be followed online at www.emf2009.com
which posts material in Spanish and in English.

I am preparing to translate a couple of items from the Italian media about this, but meanwhile, this Reuters story gives some idea of how once again, Cardinal Martino, who has had a reputation for years as a 'loose cannon' with the media - even on matters not within his competence - has, in the words of Sandro Magister, 'tossed a Molotov bomb right at the feet of the Pope'!


Vatican-Israel ties tense
over cardinal's camp comment
By Philip Pullella



VATICAN CITY, Jan 8 (Reuters) - Relations between the Vatican and Israel grew tense on Thursday when the Jewish state condemned an aide to Pope Benedict for calling Gaza "a big concentration camp".

Israel criticized Cardinal Renato Martino as the Pope delivered a speech to diplomats in which he spoke out against the use of violence by both Israel and Hamas Islamists in Gaza.

On Wednesday, Martino, president of the Vatican's Council for Justice and Peace, delivered the Vatican's toughest criticism of Israel since its offensive in the Palestinian-ruled enclave, calling Gaza a "big concentration camp". [Mr. Pulella should know - and would know - that individual cardinals do not speak for 'the Vatican' about the political and diplomatic positions of the Holy See - only the Secretariat of State and its authorized officials can do that. Even the Pope limits himself to general statements.]

"We are astounded to hear from a spiritual dignitary words that are so far removed from truth and dignity," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told Reuters.

"The vocabulary of Hamas propaganda, coming from a member of the College of Cardinals, is a shocking and disappointing phenomenon," he said.

The row over Martino's remark as well as Israel's bombing of Gaza have cast a shadow over negotiations for the Pope to visit the Holy Land in May, a trip some diplomats say is now in doubt.

The exchange of accusations heated up as the pope delivered his yearly "state of the world" speech to diplomats in which he seemed a pains to be even-handed following the furore over Martino's remarks.

The Pontiff lamented "a renewed outbreak of violence provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian population" in Gaza and Israel and urged "the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms".

"Violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned".

More than 660 Palestinians have been killed since Israel started bombarding Gaza on Dec. 27 with the aim of halting Hamas rocket attacks. Eleven Israeli soldiers have died and three Israeli civilians have been killed since the offensive began.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center also denounced Martino and compared him to a Holocaust denier.

"These remarks are untrue, distort the memory of the Holocaust and are only used against Israel by terrorist organizations and Holocaust deniers," said Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the center.

In a follow-up interview in Italy's La Repubblica newspaper on Thursday, Martino defended his comments, saying the people of Gaza "are surrounded by a wall that is difficult to breach, in conditions that go against human dignity". [The cardinal is as usual 'mis-speaking'. There is no wall surrounding Gaza (which, by the way, borders on the Mediterranean), although there is a security fence that separates part of Israel from the West Bank]

Martino said "certainly, the rockets of Hamas are not confetti. I condemn them," but forcefully criticised Israel for an attack on a U.N. school. [Which UN officials were irresponsible to keep open after the hostilities began , when it was being used by Hamas militants! What responsible person would send children to school anyway in the middle of active conflict? Israeli soldiers would have assumed the children were kept home.]



Here's a translation of what Sandro Magister had to say about it in his blog today:

Cardinal Martino tosses a Molotov bomb
at the feet of the Pope
by SANDRO MAGISTER

January 8, 2009


Cardinal Renato Martino's boutade* comparing Gaza to a 'huge concentration camp' under Israeli command was the worst service to Benedict XVI. Not only for the remark itself, but for its inopportunity.

[*Magister deliberately uses the French word, which even in English is defined as "An impulsive, often illogical turn of mind: bee, caprice, conceit, fancy, freak, humor, impulse, megrim, notion, vagary, whim, whimsy. Idioms: bee in one's bonnet." In the past three years, he has written a couple of articles at least for www.chiesa bemoaning Cardinal Martino's foot-in-mouth propensities.]

The interview given by Martino to ilSussidiario.net, the online journal of Comunione e Liberazione in the Rome area - went online yesterday, January 7, on the very eve of the Pope's annual New Year's reception for the diplomats accredited to the Holy See.

The result is that Martino's words not only overshadow the Pope's own words today, but would appear to confirm the idea that the actual thinking of the Vatican is not the moderate and measured position of official diplomacy but the 'brutally candid' positions formulated by Martino.

In his address to the diplomatic corps today, this is what Benedict VXI said about the current conflict raging in the Holy Land:

---

The birth of Christ in the lowly stable of Bethlehem leads us naturally to think of the situation in the Middle East and, in the first place, in the Holy Land, where, in these days, we have witnessed a renewed outbreak of violence provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian population.

This situation further complicates the quest for a settlement of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, something fervently desired by many of them and by the whole world.

Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned.

I express my hope that, with the decisive commitment of the international community, the ceasefire in the Gaza strip will be re-established – an indispensable condition for restoring acceptable living conditions to the population –, and that negotiations for peace will resume, with the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms.

It is very important that, in view of the crucial elections which will involve many of the inhabitants of the region in coming months, leaders will emerge who can decisively carry forward this process and guide their people towards the difficult yet indispensable reconciliation.

This cannot be reached without the adoption of a global approach to the problems of these countries, with respect for the legitimate aspirations and interests of all parties.

---

These words conform to the canons of Vatican diplomacy in this area - both in the things it says, as well as in those unsaid, as we analyzed a few days ago in the article "In Gaza, the Vatican raises the white flag".

Avvenire picked up the arguments in that article and discussed some of its themes in editorials that appeared to days in a row, written by Andrea Lavazza (in the Jan. 7 and Jan. 8 issues of the Italian bishops' newspaper), which very helpfully clarify the true positions of the Church on the Israel-Palestine issue.


Prof. Giorgio Israel wrote an article posted today in ilsussidiario.net to correct the many mis-statements Cardinal Martino made in his interview, and of course, as a Jew, to answer the cardinal's arguments. I will post the translation in the CULTURE&POLITICS thread, where I have posted previous items about the Gaza conflict in general, including Magister's article that he refers to on his blog.


In fairness to Cardinal Martino, this CNS story by Carol Glatz based on his interview with Il Sussidiario shows he also found fault with Hamas. But his 'concentration camp' metaphor - implying that Israel was responsible for such a condition - was definitely out of place, given that Hamas has been fully in control of the Gaza Strip since they forcibly evicted Palestinian Authority President Abbas and his Fatah supporters from the Gaza Strip. And of course, the Cardinal continues to be quite cavalier about some of his supposed 'facts'!


Gaza Strip resembles
a concentration camp,
says top Vatican official
By Carol Glatz



VATICAN CITY, Jan. 8 (CNS) - The Gaza Strip increasingly is looking like "a big concentration camp" while egoism, hatred, poverty and injustice are fueling the continual slaughter in the Holy Land, said a top Vatican official.

"We are seeing a continual massacre in the Holy Land where the overwhelming majority has nothing to do with the conflict but it is paying for the hatred of a few with their lives," said Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, in a Jan. 7 interview in the Italian online newspaper Il Sussidiario. [The problem is he does not say who he means by 'the hatred of a few' - in this context, it can only be Hamas, because Israel has certainly never acted out of hatred! The only hatred - expressed in as many ways as they can - is on the part of the Palestinian extremists and their masters in Iran who have all vowed repeatedly - and mean it - that Israel must be eliminated!]

Israel's foreign ministry spokesman, Yigal Palmor, criticized Cardinal Martino's comments, saying they "seem to have come directly from Hamas propaganda" and did nothing "to help bring people closer to the truth and peace."

By saying the Gaza Strip resembled a concentration camp, the cardinal was ignoring "the unspeakable crimes" committed by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, he said in a Jan. 7 interview with Agence France-Presse.

Palmor said Hamas "has derailed the peace process and has turned the Gaza Strip into a giant human shield."

In an interview with the Italian newspaper La Repubblica Jan. 8, Cardinal Martino defended his description of the Gaza Strip, saying those who criticized his remarks "can say what they want. The situation in Gaza is horrible." [It was already horrible before the Israeli offensive, which has, of course, aggravated it, but certainly did not create it.]

"I say, look at the conditions of the people who live there. Surrounded by a wall that is difficult to cross -- in conditions (that are) contrary to human dignity. What has been happening recently there is horrifying," he said. [Gaza is not surrounded by a wall! For one thing, it is fully bounded on the west by the Mediterranean! Martino must be referring to the security fence that Israel built to minimize terrorist incursions from the West Bank! Cardinals, more than journalists even, have a responsibility to be truthful, to say the least.]

He said there was nothing in his comments "that may be interpreted as anti-Israeli" and he condemned Hamas's use of violence against Israel.

But he lamented the deaths of so many Palestinian civilians and children and the destruction of nonmilitary targets by Israel, suggesting such losses could have been avoided given that Israeli forces have sophisticated surveillance "technology that can let them identify an ant on the ground." [Your Eminence, there is no airborne technology yet with X-ray vision capable of seeing through roofs and walls to find out what is within. If rockets or guns are being shot against the Israelis from any building in the warzone, they would be fooolish not to assume the building had militants who are trying to kill them, and who thus become legitimate targets. This is war, after all, even if not formally declared and not between states!]

Both Israeli and Palestinian leaders have done reproachable things, he said, but "Israel has the right to live in peace, (and) the Palestinians have the right to have their own state."

"Israel certainly has the right to defend itself and Hamas must keep that in mind," he added.

"I am not defending Hamas: If they want a home, if they want a Palestinian state, they have to understand that the path they have set out upon is wrong," said the cardinal.

He said both Israelis and Palestinians are at fault for not doing enough to stop the fighting and start peace talks. [Please explain how one can sit down and talk peace with people who repeatedly vow they will not stop until they have wiped Israel off the face of the earth!]

In the Jan. 7 interview with IlSussidiario, Cardinal Martino said: "If they are unable to come to an agreement then someone else had better feel an obligation to do it for them. The world cannot sit and watch and do nothing." [Easy enough to make self-righteous statements, Cardinal. You can't say that men of goodwill, leaders of good will from the West, have not been trying everything for decades to encourage peaceful coexistence in the Middle East, with a just solution for both Israel and Palestine! Unfortunately, Palestinian politics appears to have been hijacked by the terrorists, and when has anyone ever been able to talk reason with extremists? That is the scourge that terrorism has spawned in the world - the tyranny of sheer unbridled hatred that is completely impervious to reason.]

He called for an "international intervention force" to stop the fighting.

The reason Palestinians and Israelis have so far not been able to end the conflict and begin dialogue is because there is an acute lack of respect for human dignity, he said. [He is hallucinating! There is no dialog, because one side now insists "My way or no way at all" - but 'my way' in this case is to annihilate Israel.]

"No one recognizes the interests of the other but only one's own. However, the consequences of egoism are hatred toward others, poverty and injustice, and the defenseless are always the ones who pay," he added.

Nearly 700 Palestinians, including 300 civilians, have been killed since Israel began its attacks on Gaza Dec. 27 to root out Hamas. [I hate to sound cynical, but isn't it possible that Hamas has so brainwashed many Palestinians how 'glorious' it is to die for the terrorist cause that many of the civilian casualties may have been spared if they did as people of common sense do and got out of the way of the fighting? Even some United Nations officials are apparently so irresponsible as to keep a school open in the middle of the fighting! Come on! They surely did not expect Israeli troops to be armed only with water pistols and not shoot back at a building from which they are being shot at!]

The fighting has made access to basic needs even more difficult, as food, medicine and other relief items already were lacking due to an 18-monthlong Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip, said a Jan. 5 press release by Caritas Internationalis, an umbrella group of Catholic aid agencies.

Meanwhile, in his annual address to diplomats Jan. 8, Pope Benedict XVI appealed for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and the resumption of negotiations between Palestinians and Israelis, with the support of the international community.

"Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned," he said.

He said a cease-fire is "an indispensable condition for restoring acceptable living conditions to the population."

He urged both sides to resume negotiations and agree to "the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms."

[Dear Pope Benedict, may your prayers work, and the prayers of everyone who wants an end to this violence.

For a long time now, I can only pray - especially when meditating the third joyous mystery - "Lord, enlighten all those who need it in the land of your birth, and put an end to all the needless death and suffering. I will never understand why things are the way they are and have been for 60 years now, but you must have your reasons for why it is so. Thy will be done! But may it be an end to all this now!"

The situation reminds me of what the Holy Father and Cardinal Kasper have said so often about the prospects for Christian unification - "It does not depend on our efforts. It will come when the Holy Spirit wills it." (The obvious difference, of course, is that no one is dying from the ecumenical efforts!)

It's the best we Christians can tell ourselves about the inexplicably difficult and seemingly impossible. It may be the only realistic way (or as it is often said, 'philosophically') to deal with the Middle East standoff

Israeli ambassador 'cool'
about Cardinal Martino's remarks




Left, the Pope greets Israeli Ambassador Mordechai Lewy, who is also shown at right speaking to Italian Ambassador Antonio Zanardi Landi,
at the Vatican reception Thursday..


Vatican City, January 8 (ANSA English service) - The Israeli ambassador to the Holy See on Thursday downplayed tensions between Israel and the Vatican after Pope Benedict XVI's pointman for peace and justice, Cardinal Renato Martino, likened Gaza to 'a big concentration camp'.

Ambassador Mordechai Lewy dismissed Martino's comments, saying that the cardinal was not in charge of the Vatican's diplomatic relations and had "never seen a concentration camp in his life". [In the Italian version of this story, ANSA also quotes the ambassador as commenting that Martino's remarks were 'over the top'.]

"The relationship between Israel and the Vatican is as good as before," Lewy said.

He praised the Pope for condemning violence in Gaza and appealing to both sides for peace in his traditional New Year's address on Thursday.

Lewy added that a hope voiced by the Pope that upcoming elections in the Middle East would produce leaders capable of taking the peace process forward was not a criticism of current leaders nor aimed exclusively at Israel, where elections are due on February 10.

''There are elections coming up in other countries, such as Iran,'' he said.

Lewy also confirmed that Pope Benedict XVI would be 'welcome' if he decides to go ahead with a visit to the Holy Land that was being planned before Israel began its military offensive in Gaza 12 days ago.

According to leaks from both Israel and the Vatican the visit had been scheduled to take place in May.

"The Vatican will decide if and when the trip will take place, but there is still time," Lewy said.

Martino angered Israel on Wednesday by calling Gaza
a 'big concentration camp' in which the 'defenceless population' paid for 'the consequences of selfishiness'.

Israel responded by accusing Martino of using the same kind of language as Hamas.

On Thursday Martino defended his comments.

"They can say what they want, but the situation in Gaza is horrible - people are living in conditions that offend human dignity," he told daily La Repubblica. [Which is not Israel's fault! Hamas has been fully in charge there.]

''There was nothing that could be interpreted as anti-Israeli in my words,'' he said. ''Hamas's rockets are certainly not sugared almonds. I condemn them. Both sides have to shoulder the blame''.



Ambassador Lewy's reaction should douse the flames that media anticipated, as in Richard Owen's story below, which appears to follow the line that MSM had decided to take, and would seem to have been overtaken now by Ambassador Lewy's remarks.
.


'Concentration camp' remark
threatens Pope's visit to Israel
by Richard Owen in Rome

Jan. 9, 2009


A diplomatic row between Israel and the Vatican cast doubt over Pope Benedict XVI’s planned visit to the Holy Land yesterday, after a prominent cardinal said that Gazans were living in a “big concentration camp”.

In his annual speech to diplomats in the Vatican, the Pope sought to damp down the dispute. He said that the war was “provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian populations” in Gaza and Israel.

He urged “the rejection of hatred, acts of provocation and the use of arms” and added: “Violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned. The military solution is never an option,” he said.

His remarks came amid outrage from Israelis over a statement by Cardinal Renato Martino, the head of the Vatican Council for Justice and Peace and a former Holy See envoy to the United Nations, who compared Gaza to a concentration camp. The cardinal criticised Israel for killing civilians who had taken shelter at a UN-run school in Gaza.

Israeli officials said that they were “deeply shocked that a man of religion is using the vocabulary of Hamas propaganda”. The Simon Wiesenthal Centre, which monitors antiSemitism and hunts down Nazi war criminals, said that Cardinal Martino had used the language of a “Holocaust denier”.

In his remarks to the Italian website Il Sussidario, Cardinal Martino, one of the Pope’s closest aides, said: “Defenceless populations are always the ones who pay. Look at the conditions in Gaza: more and more, it resembles a big concentration camp.”

He condemned Hamas’s rocket attacks on Israel, saying they were “not confetti” and that Israel “certainly has the right to defend itself”.

But he added: “We need willingness from both parties because both are guilty. No one sees the interests of the other, only their own benefit. The consequences of this egoism is hatred for others, poverty and injustice. Those who pay are always the local people – just look at the conditions in Gaza.”

He responded to Israeli protests by saying: “They can say what they want. I say look at the conditions in which people live; conditions that run contrary to human dignity. What is happening in these days causes horror.”

The row has brought to the surface festering tensions over a range of issues, including plans by the Pope to beatify Pope Pius XII, the wartime Pontiff accused by critics of failing to speak out in defence of Jews during the Nazi Holocaust.

The Vatican insists that Pius XII helped Jews while avoiding public statements that would have made matters worse, and has demanded the removal of a plaque attacking Pius XII at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem.

Vatican officials also charge Israel with failing to keep promises to ease travel restrictions on Arab-Catholic clergy and remove taxes on Church-owned property in the Holy Land.

Diplomats said that although plans for Pope Benedict’s trip to Israel, Jordan and the West Bank in May were well advanced, they had now been put on hold. He had hoped to follow in the footsteps of Pope John Paul II, who in 2000 prayed at the Wailing Wall.

Rabbi Marvin Hier, the Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, said that Cardinal Martino’s remarks were “untrue, distort the memory of the Holocaust and are only used against Israel by terrorist organisations and Holocaust deniers.

“The cardinal should know that however difficult conditions may be in Gaza, the one thing it surely is not is a concentration camp where Jews were brought to die by slave labour, starvation, or in most cases, burnt in the crematorium.”



The New York Times not only got a reaction from Ambassador Lewy on its own - it also had a reaction from Fr. Lombardi 'downplaying' Cardinal Martino's remarks. But it still led with the MSM line:


Israel condemns cardinal’s
‘concentration camp’ remarks
By RACHEL DONADIO

Published: January 8, 2009


ROME — Tensions rose between the Vatican and Israel on Thursday after Israel condemned a high-ranking Vatican official for comparing the Gaza Strip to “a concentration camp.”

"Look at the conditions in Gaza: more and more, it resembles a big concentration camp,” Cardinal Renato Martino, the president of the Council for Justice and Peace, said in an interview published Wednesday in an online publication.

He defended his comments in the center-left daily newspaper La Repubblica on Thursday. While noting that Hamas rockets into Israel were “certainly not sugared almonds,” he called the situation in Gaza “horrific” and said conditions there went “against human dignity.”

Israel on Thursday harshly condemned the cardinal’s use of World War Two imagery. “We are astounded that a spiritual dignitary would have such words, that are so far removed from truth and dignity,” said Yigal Palmor, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

He added that it was “shocking to hear the vocabulary of Hamas propaganda coming from a member of the church.” But he denied that it would cause a diplomatic crisis. It “doesn’t change the nature of relations between Israel and the Holy See,” Mr. Palmor said.

The Vatican sought to downplay the cardinal’s remarks. The Vatican spokesman, Rev. Federico Lombardi, called Cardinal Martino’s choice of words “inopportune,” and said they created “irritation and confusion” more than illumination. [That's as close to a reprimand as could be made about a cardinal who heads two Vatican dicasteries! He's due for canonical retirement in March, BTW.]

While calling the cardinal “an authoritative person,” Rev. Lombardi added that “The more authoritative voice and line would be that of the Pope.” [i.e., The cardinal does not speak for the Vatican].

Indeed, the cardinal’s remarks overshadowed an important discourse that Pope Benedict XVI delivered on Thursday, in which he called for a ceasefire in Gaza and decried “a renewed outbreak of violence provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian population.”

“Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned,” he told diplomats accredited to the Vatican.

In unusually direct remarks, the Pope looked ahead to “crucial elections” coming up in the Middle East and called for dialogue between Israel and Syria, the “strengthening of institutions” in Lebanon and a “negotiated solution” to “the controversy surrounding” Iran’s nuclear program.

Israel’s ambassador to the Vatican, Mordechay Lewy, said events Gaza had “no connection” to plans underway for Benedict to visit Israel, the West Bank and Jordan this spring. The Vatican has not yet officially announced the trip.

In the past, some Jews have seen the Vatican’s approach as more sympathetic to Palestinian suffering than Israeli security. Mr. Lewy called the Pope’s speech “equivocal.”

“The language and the expectations of the Holy Father and the scope of his interests are different from those of a politician,” Mr. Lewy said. “In practical politics, I’m sure Israel wouldn’t have existed if we would have acted without any force.” [How welcome it is to hear from someone who does not just say the usual platitudes!]

January 9
St. Mitiades, Pope


OR today.

Benedict XVI to the Vatican diplomatic corps:
'Arms are not a solution; every violence must be condemned'
Page 1 also contains an editorial about the Pope's speech (translated in the post below), and a story on the rocket
attacks into northern Israel from Lebanon. The inside pages contain some articles about the emergency in
the Italian educational system.


THE POPE'S DAY

The Holy Father met today with
- Cardinal Zenon Grocholewski, Prefect of the Congregation for Catholic Education (Seminaries
and Institutes of Study)
- Mons. Nikola Eterović, Secretary-General of the Bishops' Synod
- H.E. Gábor Erdődy, Ambassador from Hungary, farewell visit
- H.E. Geoffrey Kenyon Ward, Ambassador from New Zealand, farewell visit
- H.E. Mme. Vera Barrouin Machado, Ambassador from Brazil, farewell visit
- Prof. Giovanni Maria Flick, President of Italy's Constitutional Court, and family.


Cardinal Ennio Antonelli, President of the Pontifical Copuncil for the Family, briefed the media on
the VI World Encounter of Families in Mexico City on Jan. 13-18.

The voice of the Bishop of Rome
Editorial
by Giovanni Maria Vian
Translated from
the 1/9/09 issue of



Benedict XVI's address to the Vatican diplomatic corps was realistic and concrete - an overview of the world situation which is difficult to see elsewhere.

It confirmed once more the unique point of view and authoritativeness of the Bishop of Rome, who can evoke - not with a cold bureaucratic listing of the world's crisis points - the human situations that the Church, true expert in humanity, is most concerned about.

From the sufferings caused by natural catastrophes to those that are the consequences of national or regional conflicts.

It will be easy for the editors of information outlets around the world - if they are equal to their task - to find in the Pope's words a very concrete attention to individual situations that daily concern millions of men and women every day.

Above all, the situation in the Holy Land, which has been a place of conflict for decades, and about which Benedict XVI has repeated yet again that the military option is not a solution and that every violence must be condemned.

That he was not merely saying ritual words was evident in his reference to upcoming elections in the region for both Israel and Palestine, and the support he expressed for the dialog between Syria and Israel.

In the same way, the realism of the Holy See, in the Mideast panorama, looks to the reconstruction of Iraq in which there will be no ethnic or religious discrimination, and, to negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program. In Asia, the urgency of insisting on negotiations and treaties - with the Muslim rebels of southern Philippines, between Beijing and Taipei, in Sri Lanka - and in the central parts of the continent (India and Pakistan), the need for legislation that can guarantee religious freedom.

And Africa, often overlooked by the international media, is very much present in Vatican diplomacy, above all because of the tragedies of poverty and refugees (in Somalia, Darfur, the Democratic Republic of the Congo), but also for the political crisis in Zimbabwe, in contrast to the new hope for the nation of Burundi.

The desire for peace and the conquest of poverty is equally strong in Latin America, there emigration splits families, and the battle against drugs and corruption is urgent as ever, and where acknowledgment of the Catholic presence is at least widespread, as evidenced, for instance, by the recent signing of a bilateral accord between Brazil and the Holy See.

Benedict XVI, in referring to the Pauline Year, remembered the
Christian communities of Turkey and negotiations under way in Cyprus; and finally, the tensions in the Caucasus and in the Balkans.

The realism of the Holy See - daily testified to in the world by the concern for every human being on the part of Catholics - is aimed at achieving peace. A peace that seems remote for now but that can be defined - peace today means development and security.

That is why the Holy See signed the UN convention against the use of cluster bombs, why it considers the continuing arms race scandalous, why the Catholic Church's concern about the current financial and economic crisis is concrete and growing.

Forty years have passed since Paul VI's encyclicals Populorum progressio and Humanae vitae, but their teaching in defense of human life - from poverty to its manipulation for unjust ends - is unfortunately still very actual today.

That is why, even if Christian voices often disturb the dominant culture to the point of provoking persecution and intolerance, when the Bishop of Rome speaks out, his words are always awaited.



In Il Riformista today, Paolo Rodari published an interview with OR editor Vian about his editorial above:

'To get the Vatican position
on the Gaza conflict, listen to
the Secretariat of State and
what is said by Vatican Radio
and Osservatore Romano'
Interview with G.M. Vian
by PAOLO RODARI
Translated from

Jan. 9, 2009


Mr. Vian, today you have an editorial in L'Osservatore Romano in which you describe the Pope's address yesterday to the Vatican diplomatic corps as 'concrete and realistic'. In what sense?
In the sense that Benedict XVI is able to talk about the world events which most concern him by going to the core of the problems without dwelling on the superficial.

In Gaza, he does not simply call for a suspension of hostilities or the cessation of violence, but he also points out that he hopes the forthcoming elections in the region [both Israel and Palestine] will result in the election of leaders who can lead their respective peoples towards reconciliation.


Allow me to ask: is this not some sort of interference in Israeli-Palestinian affairs? [C'mon, Rodari - how can expressing a benevolent hope with such a general statement be considered 'interference' in any way? Italian MSM has cultivated this affliction of seeing the simplest, most generic statements by the Church hierarchy about anything remotely political in nature as 'interference'. It is so unreasonable as to be absurd. ]
No, it's simply realism. The Church has a very precise point of view on questions regarding the Near and Middle East. When she speaks about the situation there, it is because she thinks it is necessary for the good of all.

And it certainly is for the good of everyone that the Holy Father called attention to the responsibility of the peoples concerned in the coming elections. In his recent message for the World Day of Peace, he recalls several times that peace is in the hands of everyone concerned.


What is the position of the Holy See on the current conflict between Israel and Hamas?
It is very balanced and one can see that in the words of the Pope on New Year's Day. Speaking of the Israeli attack in Gaza, he used the term 'massive violence' in response to 'other violence'. One can say he was showing that he understood the reasons on both sides.


Israel has said that the Vatican appeared to be using the Hamas propaganda line. [It must be made clear the Israeli reaction was to what Cardinal Martino said on his own, not speaking for the Vatican; and that Israel has apparently found the Pope's speech yesterday unexceptionable.]
The line of the Holy See is what the Secretariat of State declares. One can know and understand what the Vatican thinks of various questions by checking what the Secretariat of State says officially [through statements made by Cardinal Bertone, his deputies and authorized Vatican representatives to international organizations].

This position is communicated at the diplomatic level by the pontifical representatives present in all parts of the world [the Vatican has diplomatic relations with 177 states] and by the two principal media of the Holy See; L'Osservatore Romano and Vatican Radio.

On the most urgent questions, those that require particularly emphatic intervention, then the Press Office of the Holy See directly issues the official statements.

These days, Vatican media have maintained a consistent position on the Gaza conflict: with the highest attention and concern, as well as great balance.


Your editorial implies a call on media to be 'equal to their task'...
I believe that in many countries, Western or not, media can do much more to widen their readers' horizons on world issues, contributing to the most honest information possible, as well as to the formation of persons, especially the young.


The Pope yesterday referred once again to a 'healthy secularity'? Would a society that was healthily secular accept that thousands of Muslims occupied major church piazzas to hold their prayers, as we saw last week in Milan and Bologna?
The Pope certainly was not referring to such episodes. He spoke in general, recalling what he had said about it in his recent trip to France.

True secularity is always tolerant of all beliefs and faiths, because a genuine secular attitude acknowledges what religion can offer for the good of society. Indeed, reason can appreciate the value of faith, which can enrich it. [Rodari should have pressed him more. This is a non-answer. The question was specific and concrete, and he could have given his personal opinion while making it clear he was not speaking for the Pope or the Church.]


The Pope also cited all the other difficult situations in the world today, saying that everywhere, they should be confronted always with respect for human dignity.
The Church will always defend the dignity of every human being, without excluding anyone. Benedict XVI is well aware that in many parts of the world, human dignity is simply trod upon.