Pope commits publicly to visit Australia

Pope Benedict XVI publicly committed for the first time to visit Australia for World Youth Day 2008 during an audience with the Australian ambassador to the Holy See.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney had previously announced the pope's intentions to attend the celebration for young Catholics to be held in Sydney in July 2008. It is expected to attract 250,000 people, including between 80,000 and 100,000 from overseas.

In remarks to the Holy See's Australian ambassador, Anne Plunkett, the pope said he was overjoyed about "the visit I shall make, God willing, to Sydney for World Youth Day 2008".

"In countries such as yours, where the disquieting process of secularisation is much advanced, many young people are themselves coming to realise that it is the transcendent order that steers all life along the path of authentic freedom and happiness," the pope said.

German-born Benedict made his first trip abroad as pope to attend World Youth Day Celebrations in Cologne, Germany last August. The event, begun by Pope John Paul II, is generally held every three years.

Pope condemns Indian bans on religious conversion


By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

PARIS (Reuters) - Pope Benedict condemned Hindu nationalist attempts to ban religious conversions in India in a speech on Thursday reflecting growing tension among major faiths about the role and nature of missionary work.

In unusually strong language, the Pontiff told New Delhi's new ambassador to the Vatican that efforts in some states to outlaw conversions were unconstitutional and should be rejected.

It was his second declaration this week in defence of religious freedom in countries with non-Christian majorities. On Monday, he urged Muslim countries to give their Christian minorities the same rights as Muslims enjoyed in Western states.

"The disturbing signs of religious intolerance which have troubled some regions of the nation, including the reprehensible attempt to legislate clearly discriminatory restrictions on the fundamental right of religious freedom, must be firmly rejected," Benedict told the new ambassador, Amitava Tripathi.

Anti-conversion laws were "unconstitutional (and) contrary to the highest ideals of India's founding fathers," he said, according to the text of his speech released by the Vatican.

Also this week, representatives of world religions met in Rome to begin working on a "code of conduct" that would affirm conversion as a basic right but curb aggressive proselytising.

The Vatican and the mostly Protestant and Orthodox World Council of Churches launched the initiative after Christian minorities in India complained about aggressive proselytising by newly arrived evangelical groups.

The conversion meeting came two months after Afghanistan threatened to execute a Muslim convert to Christianity, who took refuge in Italy after an outcry from Western countries and the Vatican. Several Muslim states prescribe death for apostates.

EVEN BUDDHISTS SEEK BANS

Both Christianity and Islam are missionary religions whose scriptures tell believers to spread the faith, a mission that religious minorities usually play down to keep civil peace.

In his statement on Monday, Benedict said Christians in Muslim countries should have the right to speak openly about their religion. Saudi Arabia bars non-Muslims from building churches or making any public expression of their faith.

India's Rajasthan state passed a law last month threatening five years in prison and heavy fines for proselytising, but the governor has not yet signed it. Five other states have already passed such laws to curb missionary activity there.

The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) has been advocating conversion bans in recent years as it gained ground in state elections. India's 1.1 billion population is 80 percent Hindu, 14 percent Muslim and 3 percent Christian.

It argues that such bans foster communal harmony, but Muslim and Christian minority groups accuse the party of whipping up Hindu voters' fear to boost its political support.

Several Asian countries have considered banning conversion or found ways to discourage it in recent years. Under pressure from hardline nationalist Buddhist monks, the Sri Lankan cabinet approved such a bill last year but later dropped it.

Indonesia has no such law but a court jailed three Christian women last year for allegedly trying to convert Muslim children. Malaysia refers apostasy cases to Islamic courts, where converts can get up to three years for abandoning Islam.

Metropolitan Kirill, Pope Benedict XVI call for protecting family values

Moscow, May 18, Interfax - The Russian Orthodox and the Roman Catholic churches intend to work together to help protect and assert family values and the value of human life.

Pope Benedict XVI and Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad made a corresponding statement at their meeting in Rome on Thursday evening, deputy head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Vsevolod Chaplin told Interfax.

During the meeting, it was agreed that a common position on problems related to bio-ethics would also be useful, he said.

Metropolitan Kirill spelled out the main points of the declaration on human rights and dignity, passed by the All-Russia Church Assembly, and shared his impressions of the May 3-5 religious conference in Vienna with human rights, dignity and moral responsibility featuring prominently on its agenda.

Thursday's meeting showed the similarity of views on these issues along with the desire to continue joint work on a document that would reflect the position of the two churches on this issue, Chaplin said.

Metropolitan Kirill relayed verbal greetings from Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II. The Pope, on his part, sent Patriarch Alexy his best wishes.

Pope tells Italian bishops to make their voices heard for common good

By Cindy Wooden
5/18/2006
Catholic News Service (www.catholicnews.com)

VATICAN CITY - The day after Italy swore in a center-left government with some ministers promising to push policies opposed by the Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI told the country's bishops they had a responsibility to make their voices heard.

The church "not only recognizes and respects" the autonomy of church and state, he said May 18, but it is pleased when each segment of society is allowed to fulfill its role and responsibility.

Part of the church's duty in society is to help people see what public policies are helpful or harmful to the dignity of individuals and to the common good, he told the Italian bishops' conference holding its annual meeting at the Vatican.

By reminding politicians and citizens of the enduring value of basic ethical norms, "we do not commit any violation against the secularity of the state, but rather we contribute to guaranteeing and promoting the dignity of the person and the common good of society," the pope said.

Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi and leaders of his coalition government, who were sworn in May 17, have promised electors they would promote some type of legislation granting legal recognition to "civil unions," perhaps also including those of gay partners.

Pope Benedict told the bishops that by calling for respect for ethical norms, including respect for human life at every stage and support for the family built on the marriage of a man and a woman, "we are not imposing useless burdens, but helping (people) to advance along the path of life and authentic freedom."

Pope Benedict meets Queen Margrethe II of Denmark

May 19, 2006, 13:13 GMT
Monsters and Critics UK

Vatican City - Pope Benedict XVI on Friday met Queen Margrethe II of Denmark for a private audience at the Vatican.

The Queen, who wore a light grey suit and a hat, was accompanied by a delegation that included Danish Minister for Culture and Religion Brian Mikkelsen, the Ansa news agency reported.

The Vatican did not provide any details of what was described in reports as a 'cordial' 10-minute long meeting.

Queen Margrethe is currently in Rome to attend the opening of an exhibition featuring paintings from Denmark's so-called 'golden era.'

A lutheran, she last met a head of the Roman Catholic Church, then Pope Paul VI, in 1977.

From National Catholic Reporter
John Allen

The Papal Trip to Poland

Next week, Pope Benedict XVI will make his first trip outside Italy that is truly his own, in the sense of not being already on the books when he took over. (World Youth Day in Cologne had been scheduled for two and a half years prior to his election in April 2005).

It is no accident that Benedict's first choice of destination is to the homeland of his predecessor, John Paul II. It is yet another way of saying that carrying forward the legacy of John Paul is at the heart of Benedict's pontificate. Benedict will be visiting the sites most associated with the memory of Karol Wojtyla: Krakow, where Wojtyla served as cardinal-archbishop; Wadowice, where he grew up; Czestochowa and the Shrine of the Virgin of Jasna Gora, where he spent long hours in prayer; and Auschwitz, the fulcrum of his determination to forge a new path in Christian/Jewish relations.

That said, the Poland trip is not just a wistful trip down memory lane, a kind of final tipping of the hat to Benedict's boss and good friend for more than 20 years. There is serious business for the pope in Poland, matters that cut to the core of his chief concerns. Although media coverage will likely accent the sentimental, it would be a mistake to read these three days exclusively as a sort of rolling post-mortem tribute.

On the basis of conversations with Vatican officials over the last several days, here's how the big-ticket concerns stack up from their point of view.

(1) The European Union
In some ways, virtually every political question in Poland these days revolves around the question of Europe.

At one level, things can break down along pro- and anti-EU lines. This reality was highlighted recently when Andrzej Lepper of the populist "Self-Defense" party, often sharply critical of the EU, became the country's deputy prime minister with responsibility for agriculture and rural development, precisely the constituencies with the deepest reservations about EU membership.

The conservative Law and Justice party which won last October's elections had been governing through a minority coalition, and for a time it seemed it would broker a deal with the more centrist and EU-oriented Civic Platform. Instead, in early May it achieved a majority by including Lepper's Self-Defense party and the League of Polish Families under Roman Giertych, who has been made deputy prime minister with responsibility for education. The move considerably strengthened the position of two prominent Euro-skeptics. (As a footnote, Giertych is an Opus Dei supernumerary).

On the whole, however, few doubt that Poland will eventually take its place in the new Europe. More deeply, therefore, the real question seems to be: On what terms should Poland do so?

One Vatican official phrased the crucial question this way: "What does it mean for Poland as a Christian country to be a member of the European Union? What is its distinctive contribution?"

The last several years have produced a growing disillusionment within the Holy See about the direction of the EU. The failure to include a mention of God in the European constitution, the way Italian politician Rocco Buttiglione was blackballed as the European Minister of Justice because of his Catholic stands on abortion and homosexuality, and the recent ascendance of center-left governments that are often hostile to the church on a wide range of issues (in most acerbic form, the Zapatero government in Spain) have collectively produced a sense that John Paul's project of reawakening the Christian roots of the continent have, to date, not produced much fruit at the level of public policy.

Another reminder came this week, when Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the pope's vicar for Rome, blasted the European Parliament for a recent resolution that asked member states to revise their national legislation to ensure that homosexual unions are treated equally with respect to traditional families.

On the other hand, there is also a widespread conviction at the senior levels of the church that Catholicism cannot simply "write off" Europe, placing its trust in the numeric expansion of the church in the global South, or in the more religion-friendly culture of the United States. Europe has always been the cradle of Christian culture, and many believe it is simply too important to fail. In a sense, that was an important part of the logic for the election of Benedict XVI -- a pope who has reflected deeply about Europe and its discontents, and who proclaimed 24 hours before his election that the confrontation with a "dictatorship of relativism" is the central challenge facing the church today.

If there is hope for Europe, many senior churchmen believe, it is unlikely to come in the near term from the West, where the inroads of secularization are too deep. Instead, they pray, it may come from a Christianizing impulse from the East, where the cryogenic preservation imposed on the church under the Soviets stifled, but ironically also insulated, the faith. No European culture has the potential to deliver a stronger injection of Christian energy than traditionally ultra-Catholic Poland.

This theme will be explicit and constant in the speeches of Benedict XVI during the four-day trip. Like a leitmotif, he is expected to appeal repeatedly to the Poles to remain faithful to the traditions they have been given.

"This will run like a scarlet thread through the speeches," one Vatican official said. "The Holy Father will praise Poland's culture and traditions, and urge the Poles to be faithful to them in the changing circumstances of the country."

In that light, the pope will invite the Poles to think of their future in terms of something more than secular democracy and free trade, but as also in terms of values such as human dignity and the just society that can offer a template for a more spiritually rooted European culture.

The political challenge the pope faces is that his natural constituency, so to speak, is in the rural zones of the country where the practice of the faith and the maintenance of Catholic tradition is strongest. One Vatican official said that in northeastern Poland, Mass attendance rates reach as high as 60-70 percent. Yet these are also the places where unemployment rates reach as high as 20 percent, and anti-EU sentiment runs deep. Rather than thinking about how Poland can contribute to shaping Europe's culture, therefore, many of these Poles are more interested in how Poland can opt out of it. In the cities, meanwhile, where intellectuals and political figures are vitally interested in Poland's European future, the influence of the church is comparatively weaker.

Hence the political discussion is sometimes fractured between a conservative movement concerned about Catholic values, but sometimes tending towards radical populism; and a center-left movement that cares deeply about Europe, but not so much about the church.

How to elicit the best from all parties, allowing Poland to emerge as a constructive yet faithful partner in the European project, is the deep question.

(2) The Deep Legacy of John Paul II
Another aspiration of Benedict XVI on this trip, closely related to the above, will be to celebrate the life and legacy of John Paul II.

George Weigel, the papal biographer who runs an institute every summer in Krakow, put it this way: "He's obviously going to thank Poland for the gift it gave the church in the person of John Paul II. By going to the places that were so important to John Paul II's Christian formation -- Kalwaria, Czestochowa -- he's suggesting, or so it seems to me, that these are not just places of local or historical interest, but places which bear a message of importance for the whole church."

Even the choreography will invoke memories of John Paul. For example, when Benedict spends the night at the archbishop's residence in Krakow, he is expected to come to the window and exchange words with the crowd, exactly as Wojtyla used to do on his visits.

One Vatican official stressed, however, that Benedict wants to do more than pay tribute. He wants to lay down a gauntlet. His aim will be to urge the Poles to move from celebrating the John Paul legacy primarily in a sentimental and ceremonial way, to embracing the deep values associated with the Polish pope.

In other words, Benedict will try to argue that keeping the memory of John Paul alive is not simply a matter of putting up statues or renaming streets. It's about building the kind of society to which his teaching pointed, which includes quite specific positions on a host of issues such as abortion, marriage, biotechnology, social justice and war and peace.

In some ways, therefore, the appeal regarding Europe and the invocation of John Paul's legacy merge into the same conversation.

"There will be constant reference to John Paul" in Benedict's speeches, a Vatican source said. "The message will be that Poland should remain faithful to the gospel of Christ, which has always been its tradition, especially recently in John Paul II."

This source pointed to John Paul's speeches from his 1991 trips to Poland, his first after the collapse of Soviet Communism, as an especially important touchstone. He called for preserving the cultural and religious heritage that constituted the essence of Poland's national character, and thus should be central to a fully sovereign Poland again finding its historic roots.

That Poland has a "European vocation" was implicit in what John Paul said in Wloclawek: "The world needs a redeemed Europe."

"Do not let us, in our efforts to shape a new economy, a new economic order, take shortcuts and omit moral signposts," he said in Bialystok.

"Before I leave," John Paul said in Krakow, I ask you to accept this entire spiritual heritage that is called Poland with faith, hope, and love. . ."

One can expect reminders from Benedict of these invocations.

(3) A German Pope Visits Auschwitz
On one level, Benedict's May 28 visit to Auschwitz is another tribute to John Paul, who grew up in the shadow of the Nazis' most infamous death camp. His 1979 visit to Auschwitz included a moment of prayer before the camp's "death wall," where thousands of inmates were lined up and shot, after which John Paul called attention to a Hebrew commemoration plaque.

"That very people that received from God the commandment, 'Thou Shalt Not Kill,' itself experienced in a special measure what is meant by killing," he said. "It is not permissible for anyone to pass by this inscription with indifference."

Yet there is obviously also special resonance to an Auschwitz by Benedict XVI, a German pope, and especially one who served in the Germany army during the Second World War.

Because the question of Joseph Ratzinger's wartime experience is likely to be rehashed, it's worth once again setting the record straight.

He was a brief and involuntary member of the Hitler Youth. In 1941, when membership was made compulsory, Ratzinger was registered, though after he left the seminary a few months later he did not go to any meetings. Back in his local high school, Ratzinger said that an understanding mathematics teacher let him keep his tuition reduction despite the fact that he did not have a Hitler Youth certificate.

Ratzinger's military service began in 1943, when he and his entire seminary class (which had been temporarily disbanded) were drafted into the anti-aircraft corps. They were assigned to protect a plant for the Bavarian Motor Works, where he later recalled seeing slave laborers from the Dachau concentration camp. He was them transferred to Innsbruck, Austria, and finally to a point southwest of Munich near Lake Ammer. On September 20, 1944, Ratzinger was drafted into the regular army, assigned to a camp where the borders of Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary meet. Ratzinger said his unit was under the command of former members of the Austrian Legion, calling them "fanatical ideologues who tyrannized us without respite."

In a 1993 interview with Time, Ratzinger said his unit was put to work putting up tank traps. During this assignment, he said, he saw Hungarian Jews being shipped to their deaths.

As the bottom fell out of the German war effort in late 1944, Ratzinger and his fellow conscriptees were given civilian clothes and put on a train for home. He was drafted for military service again, assigned to a local barracks. In late April, Ratzinger deserted. When the Americans arrived in the spring of 1945, they chose the Ratzinger house as a headquarters. Joseph was identified as a solider and sent off to a prisoner of war camp. He was released on June 19, 1945, and hitchhiked a ride home with a dairy trucker.

The Ratzinger family was staunchly anti-Nazi, and Joseph Ratzinger's involvement with the war was peripheral and unwilling. Nevertheless, it permitted him a first-hand glimpse of some of the horrors the war involved.

As for the pope's attitude towards Judaism, during his August 2005 visit to the Cologne synagogue he called the Shoah, the preferred Hebrew term for the genocide of Jews by the Nazis, "an unspeakable and previously unimaginable crime."

"Today, sadly, we are witnessing the rise of new signs of anti-Semitism and various forms of a general hostility toward foreigners," he said.

"Both Jews and Christians recognize in Abraham their father in faith," he said, "and they look to the teachings of Moses and the prophets. Jewish spirituality, like its Christian counterpart, draws nourishment from the psalms. … In considering the Jewish roots of Christianity, my venerable predecessor, quoting a statement by the German Bishops, affirmed that 'whoever meets Jesus Christ meets Judaism.'"

Acknowledging great progress in Catholic/Jewish relations, Benedict said there's still work to do -- including developing the confidence to be critical of one another.

"We must come to know one another much more and much better," the pope said. "Consequently I would encourage sincere and trustful dialogue between Jews and Christians. … This dialogue, if it is to be sincere, must not gloss over or underestimate the existing differences: in those areas in which, due to our profound convictions in faith, we diverge, and indeed precisely in those areas, we need to show respect for one another."

Few would deny that Poland has made enormous strides in confronting its troubled past with respect to anti-Semitism; today, for example, there is talk about building a museum of Jewish history. Yet many believe there is also work left to be done. Controversy was aroused recently, for example, when the populist Catholic radio station "Radio Maria," one of the most popular broadcasters in the country, aired an interview with a Polish professor in which he cautioned against what he called a Jewish tendency to make an "industry" of the Holocaust. In that context, Benedict's words on the subject will be closely followed.

(4) German-Polish Reconciliation
Polish resentment over the German occupation in 1939 still festers in many quarters. Recently the Polish Defense Minister, Radek Sikorski, compared a German-Russian oil pipeline which Poland opposes to the infamous Nazi-Soviet pact of 1939, which in effect countenanced the Nazi invasion of Poland. The comment once again seemed to open old wounds.

As one sign of the lingering sensitivity, Benedict is expected to speak a few lines in Polish, and the rest of the time he will rely upon Italian. In deference to memories of the occupation, he is not expected to speak publicly in German.

Yet one of the more dramatic stories of reconciliation following World War II also involves the Poles and the Germans. In 1965, the Polish bishops sent a now-famous letter to their German counterparts, in what can only be seen as a remarkable gesture from a people with every reason to feel bitter.

"We forgive and ask for forgiveness," was the heart of the letter's message. (The request for forgiveness referred primarily to the expulsion of Germans from Poland after the war). Strongly supported by then-Archbishop Karol Wojtyla, the letter angered both Polish Nationalists and the Communists, who saw West Germany as an ideological foe.

The letter marked a turning point in the relationship not just between the two groups of bishops, but between Poles and Germans generally. In 2005, events marking the 40th anniversary of the letter were held in both nations.

Benedict is expected to make reference to the letter and its aftermath during the trip. The obvious symbolism of a German pope doing so on Polish soil will be lost on no one, and is seen as especially important in light of the still-lingering hurts that Sikorski's comment illustrates.

Thanks "benefan" - very interesting

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His aim will be to urge the Poles to move from celebrating the John Paul legacy primarily in a sentimental and ceremonial way, to embracing the deep values associated with the Polish pope.

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And that's the problem. My compatriots are better with the statues that with the books. JPII was glorified but not listened to and this things unfortunately didn't change after his death.

[Modificato da Yvonne44 19/05/2006 23.23]

Pope to bless elderly Catholics who saved Jews from Holocaust on visit to Poland

Associated Press
05/19/2006


WARSAW, Poland - Pope Benedict XVI will bless 41 elderly Polish Catholics who risked their lives to save Jews from the Holocaust during his visit next week to Poland, officials said Friday.

The German-born Benedict will give his blessing to the group on May 25 as he passes through Warsaw in his popemobile, Marcin Przeciszewski, head of the Catholic Information Agency, told The Associated Press.

All 41 have been honored as "Righteous Among the Nations" by Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

The blessing is a special addition to Benedict's May 25-28 visit itinerary, and was first proposed by Poland's Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich, as a way to honor the elderly Catholics.

Jewish leaders often ask themselves "what can we do for the 'righteous Gentiles?'" Schudrich told the AP. "What is the most meaningful gift we can give to such people? It is a blessing from the pope."

It will be offered at the monument to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, heightening the symbolism of the moment. Benedict was enrolled in the Hitler Youth as a teen and later deserted from the German army near the end of the war.

Those caught helping Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland were shot, often with their family members.

Poland, most of whose Jewish citizens were wiped out by the Nazis during World War II, has the largest number of citizens honored as "Righteous Among the Nations," reaching almost 6,000.

Tucked into the Vatican Press Office's daily bulletin today on RINUNCE E NOMINE (Resignations and Nominations) is this major item:

Pope Benedict XVI today named Cardinal Ivan Dias, Archbishop of Bombay, to be the Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

He replaces Cardinal Cresencio Sepe who has been named Archbishop of Naples.

Dias was born in 1936 and served for years in the Vatican's diplomatic service. He was named Archbishop of Bombay in November 1996 and created Caridnal by John Paul II in February 2001.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/05/2006 17.05]

Here's the AsiaNews article on what Teresa just posted.

20 May, 2006
VATICAN – INDIA

Pope: Card. Dias is new prefect of Missionary Dicastery

The archbishop of Mumbai succeeds Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, appointed archbishop of Naples today. Benedict XVI has asked the cardinal to “continue to administer the diocese” until he takes charge of his new office.


Rome (AsiaNews) – Pope Benedict XVI today appointed Cardinal Ivan Dias, Archbishop of Mumbai, as the Prefect of the Congregation for Evangelization of Peoples. The announcement was made simultaneously in the Vatican and at the Archdiocesan office.

The Pope has asked the 70-year-old Cardinal to continue as "Administrator" of the largest Catholic archdiocese in India until he takes charge of his new office at the Vatican.

Cardinal Ivan Dias, held to be ‘papabile’ at the Conclave which elected Benedict XVI, was born in Mumbai on 14 April 1936. He was ordained to the priesthood in Bombay on 8 December 1958.

He studied at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy in Rome (1961 – 1964). He obtained a doctorate in Canon Law at the Lateran University in Rome in 1964.

In 1964, he served in the Secretariat of State to prepare the visit of Paul VI to Bombay for the International Eucharistic Congress.

Between 1965 and 1973, he was secretary in the Apostolic Nunciatures in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Finland, Indonesia, Madagascar, Reunion Island, the Comoro Islands, and Mauritius.

Between 1973 and 1982, he was Chief of Desk at the Vatican Secretariat of State for the Soviet Union, the Baltic States, Belorussia, Ukraine, Poland, Bulgaria, China, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania.

On 8 May 1982, he was appointed titular Archbishop of Rusubisir and pro-apostolic nuncio in Ghana, Togo and Benin (1982-1987). On 19 June of the same year, he underwent Episcopal ordination at St Peter’s Basilica. Between 1987 and 1991, he was pro-apostolic nuncio in South Korea. From 1991 to 1887, he was apostolic nuncio in Albania.

On 8 November 1996, he was named Archbishop of Bombay and on the following 13 March, he took possession of the diocese.

He was the President Delegate at the tenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops (October 2001).

He was created Cardinal in the Consistory of 21 February 2001, with the Title of Holy Spirit in Ferratella, by John Paul II.

He is a member of the following Congregations: for the Doctrine of the Faith; for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments; for Catholic Education. He sat on the Pontifical Councils for Culture and for the Laity, and formed part of the Pontifical Commission for the Cultural Patrimony of the Church; the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See and the Council of Cardinals for the Study of the Organizational and Economic Problems of the Holy See.

Cardinal Dias succeeds Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, who Benedict XVI today appointed as archbishop of Naples.

India reacts to Pope's remarks by asserting religious tolerance

Sat May 20, 5:28 AM ET
NEW DELHI (AFP) - India has hit back at criticism attributed to Pope Benedict XVI about "disturbing signs of religious intolerance" in the country, saying people of all faiths enjoy equal rights under the law.

"It is acknowledged universally that India is a secular and democratic country in which adherents of all religious faiths enjoy equal rights," India's foreign ministry said in a statement late Friday.

"The constitution of India states that 'all persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practice and propagate religion'," the ministry said, adding it was responding to reports of the pontiff's comments.

The statement came a day after the pope reportedly criticised India for "disturbing signs of religious intolerance which have troubled some regions of India".

The Times of India, and other media, reported that the pope voiced strong criticism to India's new ambassador to the Vatican, Amitava Tripathi, over attempts by some Indian states to introduce legislation to ban what some call "forced conversions".

The pope criticised India for a "reprehensible attempt to legislate clearly discriminatory restrictions on the fundamental right of religious freedom," the Times said.

India's main opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) advocates legislation to ban "forced religious conversions," saying many Christian missionaries aggressively recruit converts among the majority Hindu population using financial and educational lures.

Christians make up just over two percent of India's 1.1 billion population but have been the target of attacks in some BJP-ruled states.

This year, the BJP government introduced a bill to ban "forced conversions" in western Rajasthan state, but the state governor refused to sign the bill.

In central Madhya Pradesh, several Christians have been arrested this year for preaching Christianity.

In one of the worst attacks on Christians, an Australian missionary who had worked with the poor for over three decades was burnt alive with his two sons as they slept in their car in 1999.

Thansk to Ratzi.lella in the main forum for two articles today from Corriere della Sera on the Pope's address yesterday to the new Ambassador of Spain to the Holy See. (A translation of the full text of the speech, which was delivered in Spanish, may be found in HOMILIES, DISCOURSES, MESSAGES). It was a very explicit message and deserves to be read in full.
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The Pope speaks:
'Don't strike at the family'
By Luigi Accatoli

VATICAN CITY – The family shall not be ”supplanted or obfuscated” by the introduction of other forms of union and the “primordial right to life” will be defended “from conception”. The Pope said this yesterday to the new ambassador from Spain to the Holy See, namely, the envoy of the Zapatero government.

In view of the Pope’s visit to Valencia on July 8-9, Spain’s (socialist and ultra-secular) Prime Minister Jose Zapatero chose a Catholic diplomat, Francisco Vazquez Vazquez, as his new ambassador.

The move appeared to please the Pope, who delivered his statements in a lower key compared to that employed by John Paul II with the previous ambsssador in June 2204 (he said he looked with “concern at alarm” at the course that was being taken by the then new government of Zapatero).

Nevertheless, Papa Ratzinger has spoken peremptorily three times in the past 10 days on the theme of the family, and Cardinal Camillo Ruini, president of the Italian bishops conference, has spoken out twice in recent days, to show that the Church wishes to make its points very clear on this matter.

The family is one of the themes that the Pope has spoken of most frequently in the first year of his Papacy, coinciding with the referendum on assisted reproduction in Italy and the proposals for PACS [Italian acronym for a law that would give same-sex and common-law unions the same rights as married couples].

“The Church,” Benedict XVI said yesterday, “proclaims without reservation the primordial right to life, from conception up to its natural end, the right to be born, to form a family and live as a family without this institution being supplanted or obfuscated by diverse forms and institutions.”

In view of the World Encounter of Families which will take the Pope to Valencia, Spain in July, the Pope said he hopes it will ”give me the opportunity to celebrate the beauty and fecundity of the family founded on matrimony, its very important vocation and its indispensable social value.”

There are three hot issues in Church and State relations in Spain: legalization of homosezual unions, the introduction of ‘rapid' divorce, and changing religious instruction in public schools from curricular (mandatory) to optional.

Referring to the contentious issue of religious ionstructi0n(the Spanish bishops hope that the oprative norms, still to be issued, will not “penalize” the Church excessively), the Pope noted “with satisfaction” the “great demand” for Catholic religious instruction in Spanish schools, “which means that the people recognize the importance of such a subject for the growth and development – personal as well as cultural – of the youth.”

Against the tendency of the laicists to relegate religion to the private sphere, the Pope laid claim to full ‘citizenship’ in the public scene, pointing out that the Church “insists on the inalienable right of persons to profess without obstacles, whether public or private, their own religious faith, as well as the right of parents to have their children educated in accordance with their own values and beliefs, without discrimination or exclusion, be it explicit or masked.”

Ambassador Vazquez (who had a 20-minute private talk with the Pope before the public presentation of credentials, and was accompanied by his wife, children and grandchildren) told newsmen later that the audience ws “cordial and affectionnate” and that it “opens a new phase in the dialog between Madrid and the Vatican.”

The Pope’s words drew protests from Daniele Capezzone, secretary of the Radical Party: “Even today, Benedict XVI has once again asserted open political intervention. It has become a daily offensive intended to write (the Church’s) own program of government, to dictate the political and parliamentary agenda.”
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The leftist Italian politicians all talk as if the Pope and the Church have no right to speak their minds about anything, and when the topics are life, family and marriage – spheres affected by proposed changes in Italian law – they go ballistic and scream ‘Political intervention!”

How is stating millennial Catholic principles an attempt to “dictate the political and parliamentary agenda”? In this particular case, the Pope was refering specifically to Spain, not Italy, so Capezzone was clearly speaking out of sheer reflex – and stupidity!

Pope to tell Poles to defend hard-won heritage

By Philip Pullella
Mon May 22, 4:34 AM ET

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Capping a year of tributes to his predecessor, Pope Benedict goes to Poland this week to urge John Paul's countrymen to defend their Christian heritage as they integrate into an increasingly secularized Europe.

The 79-year-old German Pope will spend four days in Poland starting on Thursday, visiting all the places that were central to the life and spiritual formation of John Paul, who died on April 2, 2005, after a reign of more than 26 years.

Most of the trip takes place in southern Poland -- a tour of Wadowice, where John Paul was born, Krakow, where he served as priest, bishop and cardinal, and of several religious shrines so dear to the late Pope and many Poles.

He will also visit the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz to underscore his commitment to carrying on John Paul's work of improving relations with Jews and fighting anti-Semitism.

The brief stop at the notorious death camp near Krakow will have deep personal significance for the Pope, who served briefly in the Hitler Youth during the war when membership in the Nazi paramilitary organization was compulsory.

But aides and commentators say the trip, whose motto is "Persevere in Faith," will not just be a series of connect-the-dots commemorations of one of the most towering figures of the 20th century.

Benedict will offer a road map for the spiritual future of a country that has seen many changes since the fall of communism in 1989, not all of them good in the eyes of the Church.

"In Poland, we see a slow but continuing process of secularization, a loss of sense of the faith, of the truth of faith, and the sense of being close to God," said Monsignor Pawel Ptasznik, a Vatican official who was close to John Paul.

"As Poland becomes part of Europe, Pope Benedict's message of conserving the faith -- something which we did under the communist regime -- is the most important part of the trip," Ptasznik, head of the Polish section in the Vatican's Secretariat of State, told Reuters.

POSTER CHILD SUCCESS

Poland emerged from a deep economic depression following the collapse of communism by reining in run-away inflation, cutting most state subsidies and restructuring industry through privatization, investment and job cuts.

The reforms made Poland a poster-child for market oriented changes in the 1990s, but came at a cost of nearly 20 percent unemployment and social exclusion of some middle-aged and elderly without skills to find employment.

The post-communist burst of freedom, heady as it was, and the imperfections of capitalism, have left spiritual orphans in their wake, some Church officials believe.

"An economically rich world often loses its fundamental values. A secular world often risks losing its cultural and spiritual identity," said Ptasznik. "The Pope wants to say 'don't lose the heritage of what you gained during the years of sacrifices."'

Poland's Church is less influential than in the past but the country, now a member of the European Union and NATO, is still vibrantly Christian. Some commentators say it can be a torchbearer for a Europe the Church feels is under assault by religious indifference.

"I think Benedict will address Europe's death by disbelief and that he will challenge Poland to be a leader in helping Europe re-connect itself to its Christian roots," said George Weigel, a leading American Catholic writer and papal biographer.

"Poland remains one of the world's largest intact Catholic cultures and I think it is ready to be summoned to a more assertive leadership role in Europe. I think that is what he is going to ask Poles to do," Weigel told Reuters from Washington.

One of the first acts of Benedict's papacy was to put John Paul on the fast track to eventual sainthood. The process for beatification, the last step before sainthood, is well under way.

Some commentators have speculated that the Poland trip may be a watershed mark for Benedict as the transition from John Paul reaches what some see as its natural close.

But most believe the legacy of his predecessor will likely be a permanent part of Benedict's papacy. The two worked closely together for more than 20 years and John Paul created the conditions for Benedict's election in the 2005 conclave.

"I think John Paul's shadow is a long one and I don't think it's going to wane anytime soon," said one Church official who has studied both popes.

Poles, Jews await German pope's visit to Auschwitz

Sun May 21, 2006 09:40 AM BST
By Natalia Reiter

OSWIECIM, Poland (Reuters) - Pope John Paul's trips to Poland used to be nostalgic journeys full of sweet memories of his native land. When Pope Benedict visits this week, he will face a bitter reminder of his country's past - Auschwitz.

Any visit by the head of the Catholic Church to the most infamous of former Nazi death camps is a highly-charged event, evoking knotty issues such as Christian-Jewish relations or the question whether one can believe in God after such evil.

The fact Benedict is a German further deepens the meaning this time, Polish, Jewish and German personalities told Reuters ahead of Benedict's May 25-28 trip to Poland.

"A visit by a German Pope to Auschwitz-Birkenau is a major event," said Israel's ambassador in Warsaw, David Peleg, using the full name for the death camp where about 1.5 million people - most of them Jews - were killed in the gas chambers.

"We are all looking forward to his speech there," he said.

Benedict, 79, will visit Auschwitz on Sunday at the end of a three-day tour of Poland paying homage to John Paul, who died in April of last year. John Paul visited the former death camp on his first visit here as pope in 1979.

Set up in 1940 by occupying German forces near the town Oswiecim in southern Poland as a labour camp for Poles, Auschwitz -- as they called it -- became the centrepiece in Adolf Hitler's "Final Solution" to exterminate Europe's Jews.

"OUR POPE LOVED HIM"

A German pope visiting Poland faces two forms of distrust, that of Poles dominated for centuries by their larger German neighbour and that of Jews haunted by the Holocaust that killed six million of their people.

But John Paul was a pioneer in promoting Catholic-Jewish reconciliation.

His close bond with his successor-to-be, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, with whom he spoke in German, was an example of the Polish-German understanding that developed after the war.

Stefan Wilkanowicz, deputy chairman of the International Auschwitz Council, saw in the papal visit "a clear signal that Pope Benedict wants to continue John Paul's message."

Salomon Korn, head of the German Jewish community in Frankfurt, said going to Auschwitz would show Benedict's visit to a synagogue in Cologne last year was not a one-off event.

"This is a serious and promising gesture," he said.

Rabbi David Rosen of the American Jewish Committee saw the visit as an indirect rebuff to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, noting it comes "at a time when there are world political leaders both denying the Holocaust or its scale and also calling for the exterminatioin of Israel."

At a market in Krakow, the main city near Oswiecim, used clothes seller Sylwia Orlik, 80, explained how John Paul's memory helped her deal with the horrors of the war.

"I will never forget the Germans killing our people," she said. "But to me it doesn't matter that Benedict is German. Our pope loved him ... so how could I not accept Benedict?"

HISTORY TURNS FULL CIRCLE

Not all wounds have healed. Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki recently said some Jewish groups had objected to Benedict speaking much German at the camp. He plans to pray in German there but speak mostly Italian, the Vatican's main language.

Rabbi Avi Weiss, head of the New York-based Coalition for Jewish Concerns, said Benedict should use the occasion to have a Catholic church at Birkenau removed. "That church should not be at the largest Jewish cemetery in the world," he said.

Still, the prospect of a German pope praying at the scene of some of his country's worst crimes has moved many Poles.

Krzysztof Kisielewski, who lost his father and aunt in Auschwitz, said during the annual March of the Living here in April that he saw a deep significance in Benedict's visit.

"When I think that the German Pope will pray here in a few weeks, I believe that history has turned full circle," he said.

(Additional reporting by Karin Strohecker in Berlin, Daniel Trotta in New York and Megan Goldin in Jerusalem)

Waiting for Benedict

By Carrie Gress
Sunday, 21 May 2006

A German pope will visit the homeland of his predecessor this week. How will he be received?

WARSAW, POLAND -- Warsaw is one of my favorite cities; not because it’s beautiful – in fact much of it is filled with soulless architecture built by the Communists. Yet I love it because, unlike any other city I know, it bears witness to man’s indomitable spirit. In 1944, Poles, tired of Nazi domination, revolted in the Warsaw Uprising. A ramshackle civilian army of 23,000, including children, housewives, and priests, fought against the Germans for 63 days, while waiting for the West to come to their aid. When they didn’t come and the Poles could hold out no longer, the survivors slipped out of harm’s way in a three-day march through the city’s sewers to escape the Nazis. In retaliation, Hitler ordered the destruction of the city -- nothing in Warsaw over three feet was left standing.

Sixty years later, Warsaw is a thriving, vibrant city with an old town much like any other European capital. Yet, this old town is really not so old. Rebuilt with meticulous accuracy, it takes a keen eye to see it’s not five or six hundred years old, but only sixty. Using salvaged photographs, the Poles recaptured the glory of their city’s past and maintained the old architecture, winding streets and open piazzas. Only the old cathedral deliberately betrays their efforts to hide the previous devastation -- an old crucifix is a reminder of Poland’s darkest nights, the wood is charred black and the corpus has chunks burned out of it. Such an effort to rebuild would be difficult under any circumstances but the resilient Poles managed this under the boot of communism.

Not far from the old town is Victory Square, the site of John Paul II’s first visit to Poland in 1979 after becoming pope. It was here that untold numbers of Poles shouted together in the face of communism: “We want God! We want God!” And it was God they got -- or at least the freedom to worship him as they wished. After 10 more years of struggle, John Paul helped usher in a type of independence not felt by this nation since 1863.

There is a new pope coming to this old town -- a German one. Poland has had continual tensions with Germany since the second century, which came to a fevered pitch with the Nazi occupation. But this German is a different sort. Not only is he the pope, but a trusted friend of John Paul. This fact has created much curiosity but also a warm openness to what this new pope might have to say to the Polish nation.

Work is underway for Pope Benedict’s historic visit to Warsaw this week. While requests for viewing tickets have been in large demand, some wonder about the four venues he will be visiting. Warsaw and Krakow are natural choices. But visits to Wadowice (John Paul’s hometown) and Kalavaria Zebrzydowska, (a popular pilgrimage site in a small village outside of Krakow) represent a new -- and possibly ill-advised -- strategy to the papal visit. These places are off the beaten path, making it difficult for swelling crowds to get in and out. Additionally, while both are of historic interest in John Paul’s life, a walk down memory lane may not be the best choice for what some Poles consider to be a more important purpose for Benedict’s visit.

The Polish Church under Communism grew strong, offering resistance, consolation and truth when it couldn’t be found elsewhere. But as memories of the totalitarian regime fade, the Church’s influence has weakened. John Paul warned of a growing malaise in religious faith as Poland prospered. He urged the Poles to never forget the Catholic roots from which they sprung.

Pope Benedict, keenly aware of these cultural trends in Poland and the rest of Europe, including falling birth rates and diminishing Church attendance, has made the trip’s motto “Remain strong in the Faith” in an effort to curtail a secularised Poland. After overcoming the daunting obstacles of the twentieth century the Trojan horse of secularism could be the worst threat yet to Polish faith and culture.

Radek Sikorski, Polish Defence Minister, remarked days after John Paul’s death that a child hears his father’s voice better once the father is gone. Yet this may not hold true for Poland. Agata Gerwel, a doctor in the north of Poland, and her mother, Maria, believe people have quickly forgotten John Paul in their day-to-day lives. “His death was so sad for all of Poland -- during his funeral, there was not a car on the street -- and yet now, it seems as though people have moved on from thinking about him, absorbed in their own worries and concerns.”

Although not a Pole and lacking the same charisma and charm, which endeared the Poles to their beloved John Paul, Benedict has new and different virtues to offer this great nation, including a different kind of quiet authority balanced with deep yet simple theological insights. Perhaps John Paul had become too familiar for the Poles to really heed his words -- perhaps they will better hear his message from a new voice, a new face, a new Pontiff.


Carrie Gress is an American studying in Poland. She is also a research fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington DC.

Poland to welcome Benedict XVI with joyous song, strong faith


by Karin Zeitvogel
Wed May 24, 12:53 PM ET

WARSAW (AFP) - Poland put the finishing touches on preparations for the visit of Pope Benedict XVI, as people in the overwhelmingly Catholic country focussed on their spiritual readiness to welcome the head of the world's Catholics.

"We no longer need to worry about logistics. Now we need to get ready for what will be of utmost importance during his pilgrimage: we must be strong in the faith," Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz said Wednesday after meeting with Cardinal Jozef Glemp, the primate of Poland, on the eve of the papal visit.

"Be strong in the faith" is the slogan of the visit of Benedict XVI.

"We need peace and quiet, to reflect on all that is happening within us and around us," said Marcinkiewicz, alluding to the political turmoil and social unrest that have dogged his government since he took office late last year.

Marcinkiewicz will be among the state and church officials, including President Lech Kaczynski and the Apostolic Nuncio to Poland, Archbishop Jozef Kowalczyk, who will welcome Benedict to Warsaw when his Alitalia flight from Rome arrives Thursday morning.

But before the official ceremony to welcome Benedict to the land of his hugely popular predecessor, Polish-born John Paul II, the Okecie airport employees' choir will greet the pope in song.

"We've rehearsed hymns in Polish, English, French -- we're prepared for all the languages!" said Father Slawomir Kawecki, the airport chaplain.

"This ceremony will be different to others, because it isn't a mass, but a welcome to the pope from the people, even before the official welcoming ceremony," Kawecki said.

Monks at the Marian shrine in Lichen, central Poland, will ring Poland's biggest bell, the 14-tonne "Mary Mother of God", along with the 11 other bells to welcome Benedict.

The streets of Warsaw, where city officials expect more than a million people to gather in central Pilsudski Square for a mass led by the pontiff on Friday, have been festooned for weeks with posters calling German-born Benedict "our pope" -- an endearment long reserved for John Paul II.

A bookshop on a main thoroughfare in the capital has replaced books by and about John Paul II that long had pride of place in its window display with tomes about Benedict.

A huge altar with a 25-metre (yard) tall cross, built for the huge open-air mass in Pilsudski Square, was finished early this week and will be lit up every evening until Sunday, the last day of Benedict's visit.

The structure's design is based on the altar from which John Paul II addressed his fellow Poles in Pilsudski Square in 1979, urging them to "not be afraid" and calling on the "spirit to come down and renew the face of this land".

That call was interpreted by many Poles as an exhortation to stand up to communism.

In Wadowice, families have been reciting the rosary together to prepare for Benedict's visit to the birthplace of his predecessor on Saturday.

Wadowice's faithful have also gathered on the second day of each month outside the house where John Paul II was born to sing "Barka", one of John Paul II's favourite hymns, and listen to a bugler's solemn call at 9:37 pm.

John Paul II died in Rome on April 2 last year at 9:37 pm.

"Families are a home church on which so much depends. It is on the maturity of families that the maturity of the Church rests. There is great power in the families of Wadowice. We wish to show this to the Holy Father," Wadowice parish priest, Monsignor Jakub Gil, was quoted as saying by Poland's Catholic news agency, KAI.

At his weekly general audience on Wednesday in St Peter's Square, Benedict said he was travelling to John Paul II's homeland to pray for "a Spring of renewal of the faith and civil progress in the entire country, forever keeping alive the memory of my great predecessor".

Speaking in Polish, he said: "Remain strong in the faith. This is an important message for all the Church."

Poles Like Pope, Origins and All

From Deutsche Welle
Only three percent of Poles feel Pope Benedict XVI's German origins pose a problem, with an overwhelming 80 percent saying they are not bothered by the pontiff's nationality, a new poll shows.

A separate poll in Germany turned up a different set of data: 65 percent of Germans said Benedict's German origins do count. Both polls were conducted by Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

Benedict XVI is due Thursday to start a four-day visit to Poland. His itinerary will take him to places that were significant in John Paul II's life and papacy, and also to the former Nazi death camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, on the outskirts of the southern Polish town of Oswiecim.

Hope for better relations

Last week, the Primate of Poland, Cardinal Jozef Glemp, said the visit by the pope would help to improve relations between Poles and Germans, who still have not fully healed all the wounds opened by the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, which sparked World War II.

"I think that Benedict's nationality will bring Poles and Germans closer together," Glemp said in an interview with Warsaw daily Zycie Warszawy.

Important gesture

"How can one fail to appreciate the fact that the pope, whose origins are German, is visiting -- at the beginning of his pontificate -- Warsaw, which was destroyed during the war, and the Auschwitz death camp?

"A gesture like that cannot be overlooked, either in its social or its political dimension," Glemp said.

The surveys, conducted by PBS DGA in Poland and Demoskopie Allensbach in Germany, also asked what importance Poles and Germans attached to the fact that Benedict's predecessor, John Paul II, was Polish in origin.

Eighty-two percent of Poles said it was "good" that the pope was Polish, while the remaining 18 percent attached no great weight to John Paul II's nationality. No one had a negative opinion on the matter.

In the German survey, 67 percent of respondents said the fact John Paul II was Polish was positive, 30 percent said it was unimportant, and three percent had a negative opinion.

Just a footnote to the Pope's apostolic voyage to Poland:
As much as the Polish people appear to overwhelmingly like Benedict as John Paul's successor, the Primate of Poland himself, Cardinal Josef Glemp, was the strongest advocate and supporter of Argentine Cardinal Jorge Maria Bergoglio, who ended up challenging Joseph Ratzinger in the third balloting (penultimate) of the Conclave.

This is according to the latest version of the April 2005 Conclave, as reported by journalist Emmanuele Roncalli in his new papal biography, Benedetto XVI: Dalla Baviera al mondo(From bavaria to the world).

Roncalli is a great grand-nephew of Pope John XXIII and has written other books onr eligion and church history before. He first met Cardinal Ratzinger in 1985 when he was a canon-law student at the University of Milan and wrote his graduation thesis on the former Index of prohibited books that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under Cardinal Ratzinger had 'reformed' to be in keeping with the times.

The New Curia of Benedict XVI Looks toward Asia

The new prefect of “Propaganda Fide” comes from India. And the new secretary of the congregation for the liturgy is from Sri Lanka. His first public address was the presentation of a book. And it was revealing

by Sandro Magister
Chiesa


ROMA, May 26, 2006 – On his first anniversary as pope, Benedict XVI asked God “to grant that I may be a gentle and firm Pastor.” He is already gentle and firm, to judge by his recent actions.

It’s enough to consider how on May 19 he imposed retirement from public life on one of the most powerful and untouchable men of the Church, Marcial Maciel Degollado, 86, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, venerated as a saint by his followers but accused of sexual abuse by dozens of former disciples. There was no canonical process, for reasons of age and health, but “attentive study and investigation” of the charges led to the invitation, which is in reality an obligation, to “a reserved life of prayer and penance.” But the findings did express gratitude for “the worthy apostolate” of the Legionaries of Christ, modern-day Jesuits with schools and universities all over the world for the education of the leading classes of society.

On Thursday, May 25, Benedict XVI flew to Poland for a four-day visit to the homeland of his predecessor, Karol Wojtyla. It was the first foreign trip that he planned as pope, since his earlier visit to Cologne last August was already on the agenda. He will make another trip in July, to Spain, and one to Bavaria in September. This is a sign that Europe is one of his strategic battlegrounds: this includes the fringe of Europe represented by Turkey, the destination of another trip at the end of November, with stops in Ankara, Ephesus, and Istanbul.

Pope Joseph Ratzinger is a convinced Europeanist, and he emphasized this before leaving for Poland.

Through his nuncio in Warsaw, he ordered the Polish bishops to put the brakes on Radio Maryja, the broadcasting body founded and directed by Redemptorist Fr. Tadeusz Rydzyk, which has found success in broadcasting programs against dechristianized Europe, foreigners, and Jews, with a large audience and wide agreement among Catholics and the governing right-wing parties.

In a meeting in Rome before his departure with Polish prime minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, Benedict XVI obtained his visitor’s agreement that he would also speak out against the anti-Jewish invectives of Radio Maryja: a necessary condition for the planned visit to Auschwitz of a pope, and a German pope, in the places of the Holocaust.

But the idea of Europe that Benedict XVI has in mind is very different from the one that has taken shape until now. Pope Karol Wojtyla had already denounced on a number of occasions the loss of the continent’s “Christian roots.”

Pope Ratzinger is even more severe: for him, Europe has come to the point of “hating itself.” And he sees, in the various nations of the continent, a weak and uncertain Church, incapable of responding to the challenge of the new naturalistic, scientific man without God who is emerging. Except in Italy.

For Benedict XVI, Italy is the example to point out to the other Churches and nations for a rebirth of Christian Europe. “It is the tangible witness of how a modern and secular state can still draw from the roots of its faith,” his vicar, cardinal Camillo Runi, has said.

To a Poland less Catholic than it once was, to a Spain pervaded by the secularist spirit of José Luis Zapatero, to a secularized Germany, Benedict XVI preaches an awakening of consciences based upon the “non-negotiable” principles of the sanctity of life beginning from conception; of the family composed of a father, mother, and children; of freedom of education: he emphasizes these principles constantly.

What this pope preaches is a natural decalogue, which is valid for men of all faiths. And in fact, he applies it to all: to Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, and to the non-religious secularists of the West.

In the Vatican curia, he took away the autonomy of what was formerly the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, merging it into the Pontifical Council for Culture. He maintains that there is nothing to be negotiated among the revealed faiths, but that peaceful coexistence among the religions should proceed, instead, from a dialogue of culture and civilization.

For example, whenever he talks to Muslims, Benedict XVI places at the center the question of the person and his freedom. He does not refer to the Bible or the Qur’an, but to the message “conveyed to us unmistakably by the quiet but clear voice of conscience.”

The decapitation of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, with the sending of its former president, English archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, to Cairo as a nuncio, is not the only novelty introduced into the curia by Benedict XVI. With some other well-aimed moves, pope Ratzinger has already obtained much more.

The last one, which took place on May 20, was the replacement of the “red pope,” a slang term for the cardinal prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. This prefect, in effect, has enormous power concentrated in his position. He oversees more than a thousand dioceses in mission countries, which are found in Asia, Africa, Oceania, and part of Latin America. He designates the new bishops of these dioceses. He visits them. He helps them financially, with a large budget at his disposal.

Since 2001, the office holder had been cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, previously the head of the information office of the secretariat of state (he was the one who in 1984 appointed Mario Agnes as director of “L’Osservatore Romano,” and Joaquín Navarro-Valls as director of the Vatican press office) and then the manager of the great jubilee of 2000, for which he was rewarded by John Paul II with the cardinal’s purple and appointment as prefect of “Propaganda Fide.”

Sepe made no mystery of the fact that he was aiming even higher from there, at the office of secretary of state, which he prepared for with diplomatic tours that he organized himself and which were widely publicized in “L’Osservatore Romano.” He made a memorable visit to Cuba in March of 2003, embracing and praising Fidel Castro so excessively that the Cuban bishops felt the need to issue a declaration denouncing his actions.

Benedict XVI has destined Sepe for Naples, the major city of his region of origin, where he will replace cardinal Michele Giordano, who has retired for reasons of age. Naples is a prestigious archepiscopal see, but it does not compare to the worldwide theatre of action of “Propaganda Fide.”

As the new prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, the pope has called an Indian, cardinal Ivan Dias, 70, who has been archbishop of Bombay for ten years, but before that served at the secretariat of state and as a diplomat in many countries, including Albania (his last diplomatic post), and before that South Korea, Ghana, Indonesia, and Sweden, without counting the dozens of countries he followed as a Vatican observer, including Russia, China, Vietnam, and South Africa. He has learned many languages, speaking eighteen fluently having some familiarity with others.

But even though this skill is very much adapted to his role, it is not the only reason why Benedict XVI chose him as the new prefect of “Propaganda Fide.” Much more influential was the fact that cardinal Dias, who has an excellent understanding of the Eastern religions, has never surrendered to that “relativism” of faiths that Ratzinger condemned in 2000 with the most important of his actions as the cardinal custodian of doctrine, the declaration “Dominus Iesus.”

As archbishop of Bombay, Dias has on a number of occasions complained of the fact that the Jesuits, excessively enthusiastic supporters of interreligious dialogue, play the master in the seminaries of India. His goal was to evangelize and convert, and each year he administered many baptisms. Before the last conclave he was listed among the candidates for the papacy, but in reality he was one of Ratzinger’s most resolute supporters.

Dias is not the only Asian that Benedict XVI has called to an important curia post. Another is the new secretary of the congregation for the liturgy, Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith, from Sri Lanka: in his first public appearance – on April 27, see below – he came to the defense of the tradition orientation of the liturgical prayer of the clergy and faithful, and so also of the altar, to the East, against the practice that came in after the council of turning the altar to face the people. The new Vatican nuncio to Iraq, Francis Chullikat, is Indian. And China provides the most visible of the recently nominated cardinals, the combative bishop of Hong Kong, Joseph Zen Zekiun.

Apart from Europe, pope Ratzinger has clearly placed Asia at the center of his religious geopolitics.

This is just one more reason to call a new man as head of the secretariat of state, where Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who is far from sharing Ratzinger’s approach, is waiting to be dismissed at any moment.

[Modificato da benefan 26/05/2006 20.01]

[QUOTE][DIM]7pt[=DIM]Scritto da: benefan 26/05/2006 19.53
This is just one more reason to call a new man as head of the secretariat of state, where Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who is far from sharing Ratzinger’s approach, is waiting to be dismissed at any moment.
<p><font class='xsmall'>[<i>Modificato da benefan 26/05/2006 20.01</i>]</font></p>[/DIM][/QUOTE]
Thanks, benefan, for this interesting article. I've been wondering eversince the new appointment of Cardinal Dias if Cardinal Sepe has been "demoted" simply because of his "young" age (he just turned 63 on 20May) and therefore has not much of an experience in evangelisation of peoples. This article certainly reveals a different reason.

I am glad for Papa that he has chosen the right man with great credentials to head this important office.

With regards to Cardinal Sodano, I am a little surprised to know that he does not share Papa's approach, because I'd thought that he gets along rather well with Papa...Anyway, I am no vatican observer so articles such as this are very useful.

Thanks again.

<p><font class='xsmall'>[<i>Modificato da SimplyMe 26/05/2006&nbsp;21.08</i>]</font></p>

WOW! CARDINAL DIAS SPEAKS EIGHTEEN LANGUAGES FLUENTLY????

Papa's Curia is certainly shaping up! But who will replace Sodano? No one's placing any bets so far

Sandro Magister's analysis of the emerging Curia of Benedict XVI from www.chiesa.espressonline.it/dettaglio.jsp?id=60561&eng=y
posted in the previous page also included the following appendices:
--------------------------------------------------------------

The first public appearance of the secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, archbishop Albert Malcolm Ranjith Patabendige Don, who was called to this role by Benedict XVI, was the presentation of a book on Wednesday, April 27, at the Augustinian Institute of Rome, a few steps from St. Peter’s Square.

The book, first released in the United States in 2004 with the title “Turning towards the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical Prayer” – which was published this year in Italy – was written by Uwe Michael Lang, a German liturgist who lives in London and is a member of the congregation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri.

But it also bears a preface written by Joseph Ratzinger when he was still a cardinal. As pope, he again met the author, Fr. Lang, in St. Peter’s Square at the end of the general audience the day before the presentation of the book, which he said he hoped would “have an effect.”

One gathers from the preface that Benedict XVI wants to encourage a rethinking of the orientation of the altar, the clergy, and the faithful during the celebration of the liturgy, in the light of the Church’s ancient tradition.

Pope Ratzinger does not intend to introduce sudden changes into the liturgy through the imposition of authority. But it is undeniable that his pontificate has inaugurated a more polished style of celebration, which is very visible in the pontifical liturgies over which he presides.

This is also what one gathers from the presentation of Fr. Lang’s book made by Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith in his capacity as secretary of the congregation for the liturgy.

Another test of the pope’s decisions on liturgical matters will come with the document that he will publish before the end of this year, as the capstone of the synod on the Eucharist held in Rome in October of 2005.

Here are Ranjith’s remarks on the orientation of liturgical prayer, which he gave in Italian on April 27:

“Turning towards the Lord”
by Malcolm Ranjith


Fr. Michael Lang’s book “Turning towards the Lord” – which is now being published in Italy – traces the Church’s reasons and practices, since the first centuries, relating to the direction of liturgical prayer.

The book’s objective and lucid approach will certainly make it a helpful tool for those who want to deepen their understanding on the subject. It demonstrates how the orientation of liturgical prayer as established by postconciliar reforms does not reflect the Council documents, a surprising fact.

In fact, in the preface to the book Benedict XVI, writing when he was still the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, asserts:

“To the ordinary churchgoer, the two most obvious effects of the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council seem to be the disappearance of Latin and the turning of the altars towards the people. Those who read the relevant texts will be astonished to learn that neither is in fact found in the decrees of the Council.

"The use of he vernacular is certainly permitted, especially for the Liturgy of the Word, but the preceding general rule of the Council text says, ‘Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites’ (Sacrosanctum Concilium, 36.1). There is nothing in the Council text about turning altars towards the people; that point is raised only in postconciliar instructions.”

Sacrosanctum Concilium did not call for foolhardy attitudes in this area, but for an objective and deliberate implementation of the reform. Furthermore, liturgical reform did not begin only after Vatican Council II, but had already been in motion to some extent since the time of Pius X.

Both in the process of reform preceding the Council and after it, as the Council itself intended, liturgical changes were supposed to emerge organically, and not in sudden haste. But, unfortunately, not everything went as it should have. And now some are speaking of corrections, or of a reform of the reform.

Leaving aside this reform of the reform, Fr. Lang’s book can be considered a catalyst for further improvement in the current liturgical practice of the Church. Maybe this is the reason why, in the preface, the pope expresses his hope for attentive, objective, and passionate study of this topic.

In his view, we must be able to see the positive value in what happened in the past, and listen to everyone, including those who do not agree with us, without becoming partisans labeled as “preconciliar” or “postconciliar,” “conservative” or “progressive.”

Objectivity is the key. Benedict XVI affirms this when he says: “The quest is to be achieved, not by condemning one another, but by carefully listening to the internal guidance of the liturgy itself.”

And the Church has always understood that its liturgical life must be oriented toward the Lord, and brings with it a profoundly mystical atmosphere. It is in this reality that we must find the answers.

For this reason, instead of a spirit of “free fall” that leaves everything to creativity and innovation without roots or depth, we must bring ourselves into harmony with the orientation mentioned above, and bring it to full blossom.

The pope affirms the importance of this dimension when he says that the natural direction of liturgical prayer is “versus Deum, per Jesum Christum [toward God, through Jesus Christ],” even if the priest does in fact face the people. It is not so much a question of form as of substance.

Fr. Lang’s book shows how throughout its history the Church has understood the importance of always directing its prayer toward the Lord, in terms of both content and gesture.

In order to grasp the profoundly spiritual and practical value of the Church’s liturgical life, we need not only a spirit of scientific or theological-historical research, but above all an attitude of meditation, prayer, and silence.

Those who study the historical journey of the liturgy and strive to contribute to its progress must place themselves in a posture of humbly listening to the evolution of the Church’s liturgical traditions down through the centuries, and of the important role of the magisterium.

They must also pay attention to the gradual development of these traditions within the ecclesial community, and arm themselves with a spirit of intense prayer and adoration of the Lord. This is because what happens in the Church’s celebrations of praise is not simply an earthly and human reality.

And if these mystical aspects are not betrayed, everything will become a source of edification rather than disorientation and confusion. Arbitrariness, haste, and emotional excitement should have no place in this search. The conciliar constitution on the sacred liturgy affirms this point when it says:

“That sound tradition may be retained, and yet the way remains open to legitimate progress. Careful investigation is always to be made into each part of the liturgy which is to be revised. This investigation should be theological, historical, and pastoral.

"Also the general laws governing the structure and meaning of the liturgy must be studied in conjunction with the experience derived from recent liturgical reforms and from the indults conceded to various places.

"Finally, there must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them; and care must be taken that any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, 23).

This is why this same conciliar constitution offers clear and stringent norms on who is truly competent to make decisions on liturgical innovations, asserting, among other things, that “therefore no other person, even if he be a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, 22).

This great sense of reverence toward what is being celebrated stems not only from the fact of the centrality of the liturgy in the Church’s life, affirmed by the principle “lex credendi, lex orandi,” but also from the conviction that the liturgy is not a purely human act, but a reflection of what is happening, as Sacrosanctum Concilium itself says, “in that heavenly liturgy which is celebrated in the holy city of Jerusalem toward which we journey as pilgrims.”

The liturgy is also that which is given as a gift to the community of the Church, the bride of Christ and the heavenly Jerusalem.

Unfortunately, for various reasons, which are sometimes well-intentioned, there are priests and bishops who introduce every sort of experiment and change, diminishing the sense of the sacred and mystical nature of what is depicted in the Church’s liturgical celebrations.

The temptation to become the leading actors in the divine mysteries, and to seek to control even the action of the Lord, is strong in a culture that divinizes man. In some countries, the situation is or is becoming truly dramatic. Every trace of the sacred often disappears in these so-called “liturgies.”

One of the most beautiful of flowers, the lotus flower, grows in Asia. But it grows in the mud. Even though mud is not beautiful, the flower grows out of it and orients itself toward the sun, spreading its petals and imparting beauty to its surroundings. I see a comparison to human life in this.

What truly liberates man is not what keeps him immersed in the slime of his weaknesses and decisions, but the capacity he acquires to liberate himself from these and direct his life toward the infinite and toward his Creator. It is not by lowering the sense of the divine to the human level, but by seeking to raise ourselves to supernatural levels that we will succeed in making contact with the divine mystery.

The liturgy is not what man decides it is, but what the Lord brings about within him: an attitude of adoration toward his Creator and Lord, liberating him from his slavery.

If the liturgy loses its mystical and heavenly dimension, what will help man to free himself from the mud of egoism and slavery?

If the Church does not insist upon the mystical and profoundly spiritual dimensions of life and the celebration of life, who will?

Is this not our duty to a world that is closed off within itself, becoming disoriented, insecure, locked in its own prison?

If man presumes to understand everything that the Lord does, then it is not God who judges history, but man himself. Is this not the ancient idolatry denounced by the prophets?

The Church, which must reflect the constant presence of Christ in the world, is placed at the service of humanity in order to help it to free itself from the prison of being closed in on itself, to discover its vocation to the fullness of life in the Lord, and to open itself to the joyous embrace of the infinite.

Its intimate communion with its Spouse, which is reflected and nourished above all in its liturgical life, becomes the powerful manifestation of the infinite freedom that humanity always has the possibility of reaching through it.

For this reason, preserving and enriching the spiritual mysticism of the liturgy is no longer an option for us, but a duty. If the world falls into the pit of human self-sufficiency, thus becoming more thirsty for the infinite, the Church cannot help but offer the liturgy, because in Christ humanity is raised up into the divine presence.

It is not by lowering itself to superficiality that the liturgy will motivate us to reflect the values of the infinite to the world, but by affirming these mystical and divine dimensions more and more. Today more than ever, this becomes a reflection of the prophetic role of the Church as well.

Thank you, Fr. Lang, for this book which will help us to turn our gaze ever more toward the Lord.

__________


The book:
Uwe Michael Lang, “Turning towards the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical Prayer,” Foreword by Joseph Ratzinger, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2004, pp. 158.

Its Italian translation:
Uwe Michael Lang, “Rivolti al Signore. L’orientamento nella preghiera liturgica”, Prefazione di Joseph Ratzinger, Cantagalli, Siena, 2006, pp. 152.
__________


Before being named by Benedict XVI as secretary of the congregation for the liturgy – replacing the “progressive” Domenico Sorrentino, who was made bishop of Assisi – archbishop Malcolm Ranjith, who was born in Sri Lanka, was a nuncio in Indonesia, and before that he was adjunct secretary of the Vatican Congregation for the Evangelization of peoples, which he left because of differences with then-prefect Crescenzio Sepe.

Now, as explained above, Benedict XVI has called Indian cardinal Ivan Dias to replace Sepe. On May 23, three days after the nomination, Dias – who is still in Bombay, where he has been archbishop for ten years – released a statement on the religious intolerance present in some Indian states.

The note was prompted by the controversy that followed the address Benedict XVI made on May 18 to the new Indian ambassador to the Holy See.

You can find an account of these events and the complete text of Dias’s note in this dispatch from the agency AsiaNews:
> Cardinal Dias tells fundamentalists: “Conversion is between man and God”
www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=6245

On India as the epicenter of the theological controversy over religious pluralism, see on this website:
> Disputed Questions – Like Salvation Outside of the Church (16.7.2003)
www.chiesa.espressonline.it/dettaglio.jsp?id=19632&eng=y

VATICAN CITY, May 27, 2006(AP)- Pope Benedict XVI sent condolences Saturday for the victims of the earthquake in Indonesia and appealed to rescue workers to keep up their efforts. (Initial reports put the death toll at around 3500).

His words of comfort were relayed in a telegram sent on his behalf by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Angelo Sodano while the pontiff was on a four-day pilgrimage to Poland.

"Deeply saddened to learn of the devastating earthquake near Yogyakarta, His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI prays for the victims and their grieving families, invoking eternal peace upon the deceased and divine comfort and consolation on all who are suffering," the telegram read.

Benedict added that he encouraged "rescue workers and all those involved in providing medical assistance to the victims of this disaster to persevere in their efforts to bring relief and support," according to the text released by the Vatican.

Blair to invite pope to England

LONDON, May 28 (UPI) -- British Prime Minister Tony Blair plans to invite Pope Benedict XVI to visit England when the two meet next weekend.

If the pope accepts, it would be his first official visit to England, The Times of London reported.

Next weekend's meeting will be Blair's first official meeting with Benedict XVI, who has already been invited to England by Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the Archbishop of Westminster.

Blair plans to visit with the pope during his tour of Italy.

In addition to offering a formal invitation to visit Great Britain, Blair is expected to discuss with the pope the reconciliation of the Christian and Muslim religions in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001.

Benedict's tour of England, if it happens, would likely last two or three days, the newspaper said.

Pope moved by visit to Poland

Vatican City, May. 31, 2006 (CNA) - Benedict XVI dedicated this morning's general audience to a special catechesis on his recently-concluded journey to Poland, "revisiting," together with the 35,000 faithful in St. Peter's Square, the various stages of his apostolic trip.

Recalling first his meeting with the clergy in Warsaw, he said, "My pilgrimage began under the sign of the priesthood. It continued with an expression of ecumenical solicitude in the Lutheran church of the Most Holy Trinity. On that occasion I reiterated my firm intention to consider the restoration of full visible unity among Christian as a priority of my ministry."

The Holy Father then went on to refer to "the solemn Eucharistic celebration" in Pilsudski Square, a place, he said, "that has now acquired a symbolic value, having hosted many historic events," including Masses celebrated by John Paul II, the funeral of Cardinal Wyszynski, and "mourning ceremonies in the days following the death of my predecessor."

The Pope then took a moment to remember his visits to the shrines "that marked the life of the priest and bishop, Karol Wojtyla:" Czestochowa, Kalwaria Zebrzydowska, and Divine Mercy.

"I will never forget the visit to the famous Marian Shrine of Jasna Gora at Czestochowa, ... heart of the Polish nation," he said, "where I again presented the faith as a fundamental attitude of the spirit that involves the entire person. ... From the Virgin of Sorrows at the Shrine of Kalwaria ... I asked support for the faith of the ecclesial community in moments of trial and difficulty. The visit to the Shrine of Divine Mercy ... gave me the opportunity to highlight how Divine Mercy illuminates the mystery of man. In the nearby convent, ... St. Faustina Kowalska received a message of faith for humanity, echoed and interpreted by John Paul II."

The Pope also mentioned "other symbolic shrines" of his journey: Wadowice, birthplace of John Paul II, where lay "the roots of his robust faith, his sensitive and open humanity, his love for beauty and truth, his devotion to the Virgin, his love for the Church, and above all his vocation to sanctity;" and Wawel cathedral "where he celebrated his first Mass."

Referring to his meeting with young people in Krakow's Blonie Park, the Holy Father quoted a phrase his predecessor liked to repeat: "Stand firm in your faith." This, he added, "is the duty I left to the beloved children of Poland, encouraging them to persevere in their faithfulness to Christ and to the Church, that Europe and the world may not lack their evangelical witness. All Christians must feel the commitment to bear such witness,” the Pope continued, “so as to ensure that humanity in the third millennium may never again know horrors similar to those ... of the concentration camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau."

In places such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Holy Father went on, "the only response is the Cross of Christ: the Love that descended to the abyss of evil in order to save man at his very roots, where his freedom can rebel against God."
"He concluded: "May modern man never forget Auschwitz or the other 'factories of death' in which the Nazi regime sought to eliminate God and take His place. May he not be tempted to racial hatred, which is the origin of the worst forms of anti-Semitism. May he go back to recognizing that God is Father of all, and calls us all in Christ to build together a world of justice, truth and peace.

At the conclusion of his general audience the Holy Father said: "My thoughts go out to the beloved nation of East Timor, wracked by tension and violence which has caused victims and destruction. As I encourage the local Church and Catholic organizations to continue, together with other international organizations, their efforts to help those displaced, I invite you all to pray to the Most Holy Virgin that with her maternal protection she may sustain the efforts of the people working for the pacification of souls and the return of normality."

Pope, following criticism, condemns anti-Semitism

By Philip Pullella
Wed May 31

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict, speaking after some Jewish groups complained that his recent speech at the Auschwitz former Nazi concentration camp was not strong enough, on Wednesday explicitly condemned anti-Semitism.

The 79-year-old German Pope made his comments at his weekly general audience in a speech recalling his four-day trip to Poland last week to pay homage to his predecessor John Paul.

Wednesday's address appeared to be at least in part a response to some of the criticism leveled by Jews who said he should have been more specific and less theological at Auschwitz.

"In the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, as in other similar ones, Hitler ordered the extermination of more than six million Jews," he told tens of thousands of people in St Peter's Square.

"In Auschwitz-Birkenau, 150,000 Poles were also killed, along with tens of thousands of men and women of other nationalities," he said.

"Today's humanity must not forget Auschwitz and the other 'factories of death' where the Nazi regime tried to eliminate God in order to take his place," he said. "Humanity must not give in to the temptation of racial hatred, which is at the origin of the worst forms of anti-Semitism."

Ending a four-day pilgrimage to Poland on Sunday, the Pontiff reflected on how hard it was for a German to visit the former Nazi death camp and how challenging the evil committed there was for anyone who believed in a loving God.

In his speech at the camp, he called himself "a son of Germany" and asked why God was silent when 1.5 million victims, mostly Jews, died "in this place of horror."

At the camp, the Pope twice used the world 'shoah,' the Hebrew term for the Holocaust, and said that the leaders of the Third Reich wanted to "crush the entire Jewish people (and) cancel them from the register of the peoples of the earth."

But some Jewish leaders faulted him for not clearly mentioning anti-Semitism, others for saying Germany was taken over by criminals in the 1930s, as if Hitler had not had any popular support.

"We are deeply troubled by the Pontiff's failure to explicitly address the vicious anti-Semitism that led to the murder of more than 1.5 million Jews on the ground where he stood," Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a statement.

"Standing at the crematoria, the world's largest Jewish cemetery, the Pope uttered not one world about anti-Semitism; not one explicit acknowledgement of Jewish lives vanquished simply because they were Jews," Foxman said.

The pope's speech at Auschwitz had also been criticized by a number of Jewish religious leaders, including Rome's chief rabbi Riccardo Di Segni and Amos Luzzatto, former president of Italy's Jewish communities.

"We had hoped for more, and the world deserved a simpler and more direct lesson from this pastor and preacher," Foxman said.

I find it sad that many Jewish leaders must quibble all the time when non-Jewish persons talk about the Holocaust. As the historian Ernesto Galli della Loggia commented in Corriere della Sera, "when you talk about the Jews and the horrors of the Shoah, what else but anti-Semitism are you talking about?"

I understand the concern that the Shoah must never be eradicated from the memory of mankind, but to fault everyone who fails to go into specifics about anti-Semitism and all the other gut issues for Jewish people whenever there is an occasion to do so is just unrealistic and childish.

The Pope's discourse was mainly theological, not political. And in a world where most public figures succumb easily to the siren lure and folly of political correctness, we Catholics are proud that p.c. is the least of Benedict's concerns!

Pope says art at Vatican Museums shows church's faith in God's beauty

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The masterpieces and thousands of artifacts on display at the Vatican Museums "are not simply impressive monuments of a distant past," but represent the church's unwavering faith in the beauty of God, Pope Benedict XVI told a group of the museums' benefactors.

He said that for the hundreds of thousands of visitors who flock to the museums and the Sistine Chapel every year, the artistic treasures housed there "stand as a perennial witness to the church's unchanging faith in the triune God," who, according to St. Augustine, is "beauty ever ancient, ever new."

The pope made his comments during a June 1 audience with members of the Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Museums.

The group was visiting Rome to mark the 500th anniversary of the founding of the Vatican Museums. The arts group, which helps fund the museums' conservation and restoration projects, has regional chapters in Washington and 15 U.S. states, as well as in Canada and Europe.

The pope thanked the group not only for its help in protecting and promoting the cultural and artistic heritage of the museums, but for the members' commitment to evangelization through art.

"In every age Christians have sought to give expression to faith's vision of the beauty and order of God's creation, the nobility of our vocation as men and women made in his image and likeness, and the promise of a cosmos redeemed and transfigured by the grace of Christ," he said.

Priests, bishops must proclaim the truth of Christ, says pope

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Priests and bishops must bravely and lovingly proclaim the truth of Christ and his Gospel message across the world because those hungering for spiritual nourishment are many, Pope Benedict XVI told members of the Synod of Bishops.

God's love and truth cannot be silenced, as this message of salvation is urgent for all of humanity, the pope said in a June 1 audience with members of the Synod of Bishops' permanent council.

The council was meeting in Rome to continue follow-up work on last October's Synod of Bishops on the Eucharist. Led by the synod's general secretary, Archbishop Nikola Eterovic, the council was gathering and organizing the synod's proposals to deliver to the pope so that he could draw up a post-synodal document.

The pope told council participants that Christ and the Gospel must be preached "from the rooftops" because people "are thirsty for (the truth) and they cannot be left to languish" in search of spiritual nourishment.

In this era of globalization, he said, it becomes even more necessary to carry the Gospel message to everyone "with vigor and clarity."

"The truth of evangelical love concerns every person and the whole person and compels a pastor to proclaim it without fear and reluctance," he said.

Priests cannot relinquish their mission to lovingly proclaim and pay witness to the truth of Christ based on the conditions of the world and whether preaching the Gospel would be opportune or inopportune at that moment, he added.

Meanwhile, bishops must continue to protect, feed and guide God's flock, leading the faithful not to themselves, but to the true good shepherd of Christ, the pope said.

Feeding the faithful is an act of "vigilant love" that calls for complete dedication, a great expenditure of energy and, if necessary, the sacrifice of one's life, the pope said.

But priests can draw their strength from the Eucharist, he said, so they can continue to "exercise that special pastoral charity which consists in dispensing the food of truth to the Christian people."

Marian procession closes May at Vatican

Jun. 01 (CWNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI led a prayer service at a replica of the Lourdes grotto in the Vatican gardens on Wednesday evening, after a candlelight procession through the Vatican grounds closing the month of May.

Hundreds of lay faithful from Rome joined with cardinals and bishops in the traditional Marian procession, which began at the church of St. Stephen and wound through the gardens, arriving at the grotto at about 9.

Archbishop Angelo Comastri, the vicar general of Vatican City, headed the procession. Pope Benedict joined the group at the grotto, and after kneeling for some time in silent prayer he spoke briefly.

The Holy Father recalled that during the month of May, which the Church dedicates to the Virgin Mary, the pilgrim statue of Our Lady of Fatima came to Rome for a procession in St. Peter's Square on the 25th anniversary of the failed attempt on the life of Pope John Paul II (bio - news). He went on to mention his own visit last week to the famous Polish shrine at Jasna Gora.

Pope Benedict underlined "my gratitude to Mary for her support in my daily service to the Church, noting that she "meets all her children's needs and intervenes effectively in their support." Looking forward to the coming Pentecost-eve vigil with representatives of new lay movements, he asked prayerful support for "those promising groups that have blossomed in the Church following Vatican Council II." The Vatican's Lourdes grotto, a reproduction of the famous site of the Virgin's apparitions in France, was offered to Pope Leo XIII by the Bishop of Tarbes, France, in 1902. Pope Benedict visits the site nearly every day, to pray the Rosary either by himself or with his closest aides.