Wednesday is definitely not a day to be away from the forum but I didn't even have time to translate the Pope's address at the general audience before I had to run off to go to work two hours earlier than I usually have to, and the opera tonight ... it's been a loooooong day for me So let me try to make up, late as it is.

First, how the audience was reported:

'I prayed to the one God
for all mankind' - Benedict XVI

Vatican City (AsiaNews) – The prayer in Istanbul’s Blue Mosque was “not initially planned but it turned out to be very meaningful”. It was a prayer to the “one Lord of heaven and earth, merciful father of all mankind”.

Addressing today’s general audience, this was how Benedict XVI described his silent prayer on 30 November in Istanbul.

The Pope “thanked divine Providence for this” and said: “May all believers identify themselves with the one God and bear witness to true brotherhood.”

The Pontiff augured that Turkey “will be a bridge of friendship and collaboration between East and West” and he thanked the Turkish people “for the cordiality and sympathy” they showed him throughout his stay, when “he felt loved and understood”.

For Benedict XVI, in secular Turkey, “the distinction between civil and religious spheres constitutes a principle and the State should guarantee effective religious freedom.” At the same time, he continued, “Christians and Muslims should collaborate together on issues like justice, peace and life.”

The Pope then prayed to God, so that He may “help the Turkish people, their rulers and representatives of different religions to build a future of peace together” and so that He may “make this apostolic journey fruitful and animate across the world the Church’s mission to announce to all nations the Gospel of truth, peace and love.”

The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, dwelt on the same subject during a speech delivered after last Sunday’s function.

He said: “We are sure that the voyage of the Holy Father to the Ecumenical Patriarchate will bear fruits for dialogue between Christian churches, especially between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, and more generally to inter-religious dialogue. This real improvement in our ties will contribute to peace on our planet.”

The Ecumenical Patriarchate, he added, “has long been an initiator and promoter of dialogue between religions and civilizations: it sees with great satisfaction the desire for improvement in interpersonal relations worldwide.”


Pope says Turkey shuns
'fundamentalist degeneration'
By Phil Stewart


VATICAN CITY, Dec. 6(Reuters) - Pope Benedict, speaking after a landmark trip to Turkey, described the country on Wednesday as an example of a secular Muslim state able to shun "fundamentalist degeneration."

In remarks at his weekly general audience, he also expressed hope that Turkey could become a "bridge of friendship and brotherly cooperation between the West and East."

The Pope said that since Turkey was predominantly Muslim but regulated by a secular constitution it was "emblematic" of the challenge facing states trying to balance religious expression and the needs of civil society.

He held up Turkey as an example of how a country can "guarantee that the expression of such a faith be free, without fundamentalist degeneration, and capable of firmly repudiating every form of violence."

The Pope's trip last week seems to have persuaded many Turks to move beyond the tensions caused by a speech last September in which he quoted a Byzantine emperor calling Islam violent. The speech infuriated Muslims around the world.

During the visit he called Islam a peaceful faith and on Wednesday he expressed hope that Christians and Muslims could work together "for life, peace and justice."

Benedict became the second Roman Catholic Pontiff to visit a mosque when he stopped to pray at Istanbul's Blue Mosque.

"Pausing for a few minutes being received in this place of prayer, I addressed the one Lord of heaven and earth, father of mercy for all humanity," he said.

During the trip, he did an about-face and voiced support for Ankara's bid to join the European Union. Before being elected Pope in April 2005, he had opposed Turkey's entry.


Pope expresses admiration for Muslims
By DANIELA PETROFF
Associated Press Writer


VATICAN CITY, DEc. 6 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI expressed his admiration for Muslims and Islam on Wednesday, and called for freedom of religion and faith that rejects all forms of violence.

The pontiff, who returned Friday from the four-day visit to Turkey that included a stop at Istanbul's Blue Mosque, discussed his trip during his weekly audience at the Vatican.

As a secular state with a predominantly Muslim population, Turkey is an emblem of the challenge for much of the world, Benedict said.

"On one side, it is necessary to rediscover the reality of God and public importance of religious faith, on the other to assure that the expression of faith is free, devoid of fundamentalist degeneration, capable of firmly repudiating any form of violence," the pontiff said.

"I therefore was given the propitious occasion to renew my sentiments of esteem for Muslims and the Islamic civilization," Benedict added. "At the same time I was able to insist on the importance that Christians and Muslims work together for mankind, for life, for peace and for justice."

Benedict's trip was originally envisioned as a pilgrimage to reinforce Christian bonds and reach out to Turkey's remaining Christians, including Catholics estimated to number between 20,000 and 30,000.

But after the pope gave a speech in September that angered many Muslims, it became a test of the Vatican's ability to mend ties with the Islamic world.

Muslims throughout the world reacted angrily — and in some cases violently — to the speech in which Benedict quoted a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."

Benedict's visit to a mosque was only the second in papal history. His predecessor Pope John Paul II made a groundbreaking visit to the Ummayad Mosque in Damascus, Syria, in 2001.

On Wednesday, the pope described his visit to the mosque as "a gesture that was not initially planned but that turned out to have great significance."

"During a few minutes of reflection in that place of worship I turned to the only God of heaven and earth," Benedict said. "May all believers see themselves as his creatures and bear witness of true brotherhood."

During his trip, the pope also made some sensitive demands: wider protection and rights for Christian minorities in the Muslim world, including Turkey's tiny communities whose roots go back to the apostles.


Reflecting on Turkey,
pope sharpens tone on religious freedom
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 6, 2006

Commenting this morning on his recent trip to Turkey, Benedict XVI appeared to sharpen his rhetoric on religious freedom, challenging Muslim governments to ensure that expressions of religious faith do not fail to protect individual freedom, that they do not shade off into fundamentalism, and that they’re capable “of rejecting every form of violence.”

In contrast with remarks Nov. 29 during a Mass in Ephesus, when the pope limited himself to a passing reference to the “fine witness” of Italian missionary Fr. Andrea Santoro, shot to death in Trabzon, Turkey, in February by a young Muslim who said he was agitated by the Danish cartoon controversy, Benedict this morning also specifically added that Santoro paid for that witness “with his own blood.”

At the same time, Benedict told the large crowd in the Paul VI Audience Hall in the Vatican that he had returned with “a soul full of gratitude” for the trip to Turkey, where he said he felt “welcomed and understood.”

Benedict XVI expressed “great esteem for the inhabitants of the beloved Turkish nation,” saying he had traveled in the footsteps of his predecessors Pope Paul VI and John Paul II, both of whom made trips to Turkey, as well as Pope John XXIII, who served as the Apostolic Delegate in that nation from 1935 to 1944.

The pope spoke during his Wednesday General Audience, describing papal trips in light of the vision of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) as addressed to three “concentric circles”: the local Catholic community, the wider Christian faithful, and finally to the believers of other religions and to all humanity.

Benedict said his trip, which he acknowledged was “not an easy one under several aspects,” had special significance at the third level. Turkey, he said, “is an overwhelmingly Muslim country, but one which is regulated by a constitution that affirms the secular character of the state.”

In that regard, Benedict said, Turkey is “emblematic” of what he described as a “great challenge at the world level” – to rediscover “the reality of God and the public significance of religious faith,” but at the same to ensure that "the expression of that faith is free," not marred by "fundamentalistic degenerations," and "capable of firmly repudiating every form of religious violence."

That, in a nutshell, captures the challenge which Benedict has offered in his conversations with Muslims since his election to the papacy.

Benedict said he wanted to “insist that Christians and Muslims commit themselves together to the defense of the human person, of life, justice and peace.” In that regard, he said, “the distinction between civil and religious spheres is a value, and the state must assure both to citizens and to religious communities liberty of cult.”

The pope also spoke about his moment of silent prayer alongside Istanbul’s chief Islamic cleric in the Blue Mosque on Nov. 30, describing it as an “initially unexpected” and “very meaningful” gesture that Divine Providence had allowed him to undertake.

Benedict characterized what happened as “a few moments of recollection in that place of prayer,” and suggested that he had addressed himself “to the one Lord of Heaven and Earth, the merciful Father of all humanity."

He said he hoped the act would lead “all believers to recognize themselves as creatures,” and said that it was “a witness to true fraternity.”

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 07/12/2006 6.14]

Because this analysis is basically about Benedict rather than the Turkey visit, I am posting it here first.


Turkey and Regensburg:
the same Pope
by Samir Khalil Samir, SJ


In his meetings in Turkey, Benedict XVI launched once again the ideas of Regensburg, building opportunities for encounter and dialogue between West and East. The urgency of condemning violence and safeguarding “open” secularity, against the temptation of politics that marginalizes religion and religion that monopolizes politics.

Beirut (AsiaNews) – The enthusiasm with which the Turks welcomed Benedict XVI and the positive assessment made by local media have taken everyone by surprise.

On the eve of the Pope’s visit, concerns prevailed in Turkey (and the Pope himself said that he was “worried”) as did fears, in connection with violent threats from Iraqi branches of Al-Qaeda.

What prevailed most was a certain prejudice against Benedict XVI – that he was “anti-Turkish”, “anti-Islam”, an “inquisitor”, a “conservative” – as well as a partial and ideological reading of his Regensburg speech, labelled as “the gaffe”, the “blunder” of the pontificate which risked sparking war between Islam and the West, with the quotation of Manuel II Paleologus and the “presumption” of bringing together Religion and Reason, excluding violence, and instead implying that too often Islam and violence go together.

But now, most comments are that “finally” Regensburg has been forgotten, wiped out, killed and the Pope changed his “policy” in Turkey, having become even an astute politician who is more careful about opportunity than about truth.

Actually, though, the Pope’s message in Turkey is a continuation of that of Regensburg.

The essential message at Regensburg was two-fold.

Firstly, with a view toward the West, it was to say that secularization is not a positive thing and does not allow for universal dialogue. Instead, Reason allows for universal dialogue on the condition that it is not detached from religiosity and from moral principles. This was a critique of the West. There was also a critique of the Islamic world, too tempted by violence.

The final aim of this two-fold critique was a positive affirmation: if we want universal peace and global dialogue, these aspirations are threatened in the West and the East by these two main issues.

The Pope is thus striving to build a philosophical-theological framework centred on rationality, but a rationality which is open to the transcendental dimension. In his trip to Turkey, Benedict XVI gave substance to this vision, applying it to a concrete situation, but his thinking remains that of Regensburg.

Speaking to the Muslims, he discretely recalled the question of violence, but avoided the misunderstanding which occurred with his words at Regensburg.

There, media said that the Pope identified Islam with violence. Instead, he had pointed his finger at an existing and dangerous reality, that of violence in the Islamic world, without establishing a total equivalency between Islam and violence.

The proof of this, we know, lies in the fact that, at Regensburg, the Pope quoted one single verse of the Koran, the most positive, the one according to which, in Islam, on matters of faith, “there is no constriction.” The Pope thus suggested that for authentic Islam, there can be absolutely no use for either violence or moral pressure.

And quoting the much-discussed text of Manuel II Paleologus – the “novelties of Islam are just violence and evil” – he distanced himself from it, even though he did not say it was false. It was false in its generalization, but not in having sensed a danger.

The Pope made clear that that is not an accusation against Islam in general, but a risk that exists in Islam. And who can deny it?

From this point of view, what was said by the President of Religious Affairs in Turkey, Ali Bardakoglu, seems to me absurd. He said that it is scientifically impossible to maintain this thesis, according to which, historically, Islam was spread through violence. This is absurd.

Many Muslim historians have written that the spread of Islam, especially in the initial phase, in the Middle East and North Africa, occurred through war. In other parts, in Indonesia, Malaysia, India, etc., it occurred instead through commerce and the Sufis (mystics).

Often Islam did not force people to become Muslim, but gave rise to a social and political system by which, to have a say in this society and to play a political role, one needed to become Muslim.

The social system foreseen by Islam – and already foreseen in the Koran – pushes non-Muslims to become Muslim if they want to have a role in society. In so doing, Islam reduced Christian communities to intellectually, socially and politically weak minorities. This involves constriction, contrary to what is said in the Koranic verse mentioned above.

Benedict XVI reminded Bardakaglu that collaboration between Christians and Muslims needs to have at its basis attention for “the truth of the sacred character and dignity of the person,” in “respect for the responsible choices that each person makes, especially those pertaining…to personal religious convictions.”

The message to the West – dealt with in the Pontiff’s meeting with the diplomatic corps at Ankara – is that of secularity open to the spiritual.

The Pope returned to this theme – which he had already dealt with at Regensburg – to apply it to the secularity of the Turkish government, calling for freedom of religion and of conscience. In theory, the West recognizes religious freedom. The point is that Western secularity goes as far as to exclude all that is religious, putting it into the private domain.

Turkey’s secularity is Islamic secularity: limits are set on whoever is not nationalistic and Islamic so that national identity is not jeopardized.

In the past week, two Turkish converts from Islam were condemned by virtue of the law on national identity (article 301 of the criminal code). This is the same accusation (and sentence) that is made against those who dare to speak of or recognize the Armenian genocide.

The Pope insisted much on freedom of conscience. And he made an appeal to the Islamic world by praising Turkish secularity, which allows for a distinction between state and religion. He highlighted this aspect, recalling that religions must stay out of politics, “as that [Editor’s note: direct politics], is not their province.”

Benedict XVI is thus striving to find a middle way for all humanity that allows for the interrelation between religion, spirituality, reason, secularity and state. Being in the Western world, he insists on a secularity which is “open” to the spiritual.

There thus exists continuity in the Pope’s speeches in Turkey with what he said at Regensburg, in looking for a way of communication between politics and religion, against the monopoly of religion on politics and against the monopoly of politics which excludes religion.

JERUSALEM, Dec. 7 (AP) - Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will meet with Pope Benedict XVI during a trip to Europe next week, officials said Thursday.

Olmert's spokeswoman, Miri Eisin, said the meeting will take place at the Vatican on Wednesday, Dec. 12. There were no immediate details on the agenda.

While such meetings are rare, it is not the first time an Israeli leader will meet with the leader of the world's Roman Catholics.

Israel and the Vatican established diplomatic relations in the 1990s, and the late Pope John Paul II hosted Israeli prime ministers and other officials as part of his effort to build ties with the Jewish state.

---

Scritto da: TERESA BENEDETTA 07/12/2006 15.30

While such meetings are rare, it is not the first time an Israeli leader will meet with the leader of the world's Roman Catholics.

---

Hahaha, I have to laugh about stupidity of new agency: RARE MEETINGS??? Papa have met president of Israel and prime minister Ariel Sharon only year ago. The main reason for this meeting is Olmert has renewed invitation for Papa to visit Israel and Israel and Vatican are working on new treaty. I bet this will be for some left commentators "signal".

[Modificato da Maklara 07/12/2006 16.02]

Dear Maklara...Sorry I did not have the time this morning to look for a more informed news item about the Olmert visit than that one. Hopefully, we will be getting more professional reports about the visit as it gets nearer.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 08/12/2006 3.06]

Two brief notes from the Italian press, shared by Lella in the main forum:

On January 4, 2007, the Pope will visit the communal dining hall run by Caritas in Rome, at the Colle Oppio, about 500 meters away from the Roman Colosseum. The halll feeds about 700 indigent and homeless people every day.

And in Assisi, Bishop Domenico Sorrentino has announced that the Pope will visit the Franciscan shrines on June 17, 2007, marking the eighth centenary of the conversion of St. Francis.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 08/12/2006 14.43]

Here is an unusual way to report on an ad-limina visit with the Holy Father - a Radio Vatican interview, translated here, with one of the bishops of Lazio region who saw him earlier this week at the Vatican. It is a tribute as well to the mostly unsung work of these frontline workers in the vineyard of the Lord..

ROME, Dec. 7 (RV) - The Pope received today another group of bishops from Lazio who began their 'ad limina' visit last Monday.

At the General Audience on Wednesday, the Pope greeted them and their parishioners inside St. Peter's Basilica, inviting them to a 'courageous evangelizing action' to announce Christ as 'the Savior of all men.'

One of the bishops who met with the Pope is Mons. Domenico Sigalini, Bishop of Palestrina.

Fabio Colgrande asked him about his conversation with the Pope:
It was beautiful in its simplicty. The Pope is truly an exquisite person, a gentleman, who is most sensitive, who listens to everything you want to tell him, who asks relevant questions...

The 'rite' is very simple. You enter, the Pope shakes your hand, photographs are taken because of course one wants to keep an evidence of this meeting, after which we all sit at the table, and we start to converse - about priests, about the faithful, about various problems.

For me, the main problem concerns the youth, because around Rome, in Lazio, it is not as if we excel in having appropriate places for dialog, for encounter, for welcoming young people.

In our dioceses, we do not have oratories, relations have not been developed wioth the youth, associations have been dwindling - and I wanted to communicate this to the Pope, and indeed, he caught the urgency of creaeting bridges to the Church specifically for young people...

When you became Bishop in May 2005, you wrote a letter to your diocese. In the first paragraph, I was immediately struck that you paid special attention to those who have abandoned the faith...
Yes, because, in my opinion, my diocese, our people in Lazio, like the rest of Italy, need a regeneration of the faith.

We are Catholics by ancient tradition, but this Catholicism has been buried in the dust of habit, has been cast into a mold. Today, the faith should be rediscovered ex novo thus truly giving it a new impulse. We have been drowsing. So I think this should be the primary mission of every Christian community these days.

Yesterday, during the general audience, the Pope asked for "a courageous evangelizing action.' How can such courage be concretized?
I think this can be done not only by doing our parochial work well - helping everyone to encounter God, living the sacramental life - but also by getting out of our sacristies into the streets, into the public squares...

My diocese is one of commuters- 6,000 of them take the train every day to go to work. So we have placed a prayer tent in front of the train station to show people that we re with them, that the Church is there. That people journeying to work are accompanied by their Church, by their God, with whom they can share their difficulties and their efforts.

In your pastoral letter, you also asked the local church to be a Church that is made up 'neither of Taliban types nor spineless people" - why these two categories?
Because, unfortunately, where faith is concerned, one is tempted to say: "I am a believer, this puts me under protection, nothing can go wrong for me." That's not a reasonable attitude! But there are also the spineless ones - who do not hold much in their faith and therefore, everything else is OK...

But a balanced faith that is an intellectually reasoned act as well as something that is humanly felt, should characterize our way of believing these days.

The Pope reminds us all the time: this widening of the space of reason, but also looking more profoundly into the sense and significance of the faith. Therefore, a Christian whose thinking has matured in that way would be able to propose and articulate his belief to others - not as a Diktat, but he will find the right words, secular words, to express the fullness of his heart to others. At the same time, he will be better able to listen to the word of God that illuminates and that will help him look at his life from a point of view that he alone would not have.

And your wish for this ad-limina visit?
That our diocese of Palestrina can renew its faith with great courage, a faith that has been gained by our own martyrs...A young boy Agapito, at age 15, was able to change the world around him in the past. Why can't we do that today?

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 09/12/2006 4.01]

Czech bishop conference reports:

A delegation of the Israeli government visited the Holy See on November 27 to renew its invitation to Benedict XVI to visit Israel and to establish an agenda of negotiations: a pair of meetings of the Israel – Holy See Permanent Bilateral Commission on key issues in the Church – state relationship.

Even there is no info about Olmert's visit,I think the good reason is the fact, Israeli PM is going to visit italian government, so he will of course stop in Vatican. As I said above, the last Israeli PM coming to Papa was Ariel Sharon who is now as we all know in coma. I'm pleased new Israel PM see the relationships with Holy See as important thing also.

[Modificato da Maklara 08/12/2006 19.25]

It's seems very likely the Holy Father may visit the Holy Land next year. He has made references to it with some of his visitors a number of times, according to the visitors (last expressed to the President of Cyprus), and renewal of the invitation by an Israeli delegation, followed by Olmert himself visiting, would seem to formalize the invitation in the protocol sense - considering that Ariel Sharon, who originally made the invitation, is unfortunately stricken. And I think I did read in one of the Italian news items an incidental remark about Israel's wish to straighten out property questions with the Roman Catholic Church., which would presumably be resolved in time for a papal visit.

And if Turkey was so historical and momentous, imagine what a trip to the Holy Land would be - with the triple resonance of Jerusalem as capital of the three monotheistic religions, and the fate and fortunes of Christian minorities all over the Middle East in play, plus the political questions of Palestine and Lebanon. The planning possibilities for an itinerary are staggering, especially as no great distances are involved - from Jerusalem, a helicopter could take him to southern Lebanon in less than an hour, for example.

When John Paul II visited the Holy Land, I thought to myself that as a journalist, that would have been the dream assignment of a lifetime. Well, guess what!

Anyway, if the Pope visited Jerusalem, would he go to Al-Aqsa, which is Islam's holiest site after Mecca? He was there once as a cardinal, apparently.

Which brings us to the hair-splitting that goes on about what the Pope did in front of the mizrah in the Blue Mosque (he prayed!) and whether he had thereby sent a confusing theological message (But what is confusing about a spontaneous private prayer inside a temple of worship to the one God? - even if it takes place in front of TV cameras that transmitted the moment across the globe!)

About the one God worshipped by Muslims, there is no question it is the one God referred to in Nostra aetate who is shared by the three monotheistic religions. Some Muslims may have a different concept of the nature of the one God (is he Logos or Arbitrios, is he loving or stern, is he an intimate presence or is he remote, etc) but the one God is the one God. There cannot be two, although our one God is also Triune.

The ongoing 'argument' sounds to me very much like disputing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin (My impertinent answer all along: Who cares? and Why would they want to dance on the head of a pin anyway?).

All that, by way of introducing today's column by John Allen who joins the quibbling [in this, he indulges the journalistic game of keeping an issue alive, even if the issue is not an issue, or an artificial one, as I think this is]. But he does offer some pertinent quotations about prayer from Cardinal Ratzinger and Pope Benedict both.

================================================================

Analyzing Benedict’s prayer
with Ratzinger’s criteria
All Things Catholic
by John L. Allen, Jr.
Friday, Dec. 8, 2006



Whatever one makes of Pope Benedict XVI’s shift from a “red light” to a “yellow light” on Turkey’s candidacy for the European Union, it was actually not the most jarring discontinuity between Joseph Ratzinger the cardinal and Benedict the pope during the Turkey trip.

When Benedict XVI stood alongside Istanbul’s chief Islamic cleric, Imam Mustafa Cagrici, in the famed Blue Mosque on Nov. 30, praying silently in the direction of Mecca, those who know Ratzinger’s track record no doubt asked: What happened to the man who once worried that inter-religious prayer can mean “a concession to that relativism which negates the very meaning of truth?”

This was, after all, the same champion of Catholic identity who said of Pope John Paul II’s 1986 summit of religious leaders in Assisi to pray together for peace - or, at least, of the way that event was understood in some circles - “This cannot be the model!” [We're comparing figs and dates here, to localize a metaphor!]

Jesuit Fr. Tom Michel, who served in the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue from 1981 to 1994, and who was among the architects of the ‘86 summit, told me that he saw “no theological difference” between what happened in Assisi and Benedict’s moment of prayer alongside the imam in Istanbul. [Fr. Michel isn't exactly the most impartial person to ask about this matter, as he has a vested interest in defending the Assisi prayers!]

Predictably, some Catholics were scandalized. Fox News commentator Fr. Jonathan Morris, a member of the Legionaries of Christ, wrote the next day that his in-box was “full of angry letters,” such as one exclaiming, “Islam is a false religion, Muhammad is a false prophet, and the Quran is anything but sacred. How dare the Pope lend credence to such heresy!” (Morris, by the way, was not necessarily endorsing that view, merely reporting it.) [He also happened to quote an example of blind and ignorant Catholic fundamentalism!]

We’ve reached an interesting moment indeed in Catholic affairs when such complaints could be hurled against the man once known as “God’s Rottweiler” for his ferocious defense of the faith.

So, what gives? Was this a case of naked papal opportunism, a post-Regensburg lust for positive headlines in the Muslim world that swept aside doctrinal concerns? Has Benedict the pope “changed his spots” from Ratzinger the doctrinal czar? Or is there a sense in which what happened in Istanbul can be understood as consistent with Ratzinger’s earlier positions?

[What gives, for the nth time, is that when the occasion presented itself unexpectedly, the Pope said a private prayer inside a Muslim house of worship - after which he told his Mulsim host, "Thank you for the moment of prayer." PLAIN AND SIMPLE AND NOT NEEDING ANY EXPLANATION, let alone all sorts of defense mechanisms as exhibited by Fr. Lombardi and even someone as sharp as Cardinal Kasper!]

To answer that question, one has to review Ratzinger’s thought on prayer with followers of other religions. Probably the most complete treatment comes in his 2003 book, Truth and Tolerance. There, Ratzinger asserts it is “indisputable that the Assisi meetings, especially in 1986, were misinterpreted by many people.” By that, he meant that in some circles Assisi promoted a “one’s as good as another” view of religions which, in his view, amounts to relativism.

Nevertheless, Ratzinger goes on to say that it would be wrong to reject prayer with believers of other religions “completely and unconditionally”. He distinguishes between “multi-religious” prayer, when followers of different religions pray in the same context but separately, and “inter-religious” prayer, when they pray together.

For multi-religious prayer to be acceptable, he said, two conditions have to be met:

“Such multi-religious prayer cannot be the normal form of religious life, but can only exist as a sign in unusual situations in which, as it were, a common cry for help rises up, stirring the hearts of men, to stir also the heart of God.”
“A careful explanation of what happens here and what does not happen is most important … [it] must make clear that there is no such thing as a common concept of God or belief in God … What is happening must be so clear in itself, and to the world, that it does not become a demonstration of that relativism through which it would nullify its own significance.”
As for inter-religious prayer, Ratzinger expressed strong doubt that it’s even theologically possible.

In the first place, he said, we would have to have the same concept of God -- “any confusion of a personal and an impersonal understanding, of God and the gods, must be excluded.” Second, there would have to be agreement on the content of prayer, and here Ratzinger suggested the Lord’s Prayer as a model. Finally, the whole thing would have to be arranged so as to make a “relativistic misinterpretation” impossible.

As pope, Benedict XVI returned to these concerns in a message he sent commemorating the 20th anniversary of John Paul II’s 1986 summit in Assisi.

“It’s important not to forget the attention that was given [in 1986] to ensuring that an inter-religious meeting not lend itself to syncretistic interpretations, founded on a relativistic conception,” Benedict said. “It’s obligatory to avoid inopportune confusions. When we come together for prayer for peace, the prayer must unfold according to the distinct paths that pertain to the various religions.”

It’s an interesting thought exercise to ask if Benedict understood his moment of prayer alongside the imam in the Blue Mosque as an instance of “multi-religious” or “inter-religious” prayer, as he defined the terms in 2003. Given his doubts about the latter, one presumes he saw it as a “multi-religious” act, meaning separate prayer in the same context. It was obviously not “separate” in a physical or temporal sense, yet because it was non-verbal, each man could pray according to the distinctive beliefs of his own creed.

Certainly, the visit to the Blue Mosque would fit Benedict’s criterion of an “unusual situation.” This was, after all, only the second time a pope has entered a mosque, and hence is hardly likely to become “the normal form of religious life.”

Yet if this was “multi-religious prayer” according to Ratzinger’s standards, where, one might fairly ask, was the “careful explanation” which Ratzinger said must always be part and parcel of such events?

The lone comment offered by Benedict XVI at the end of his visit was, “Thank you for this moment of prayer.” The only additional statement from a Vatican official came from Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity, who accompanied Benedict to Turkey, and who spoke to Italy’s Sky TG24 immediately after the stop at the mosque.

“It was a recollection, a meditation, but this can be done. If it was a prayer, at least it was not an official prayer, it was not a public prayer, because this can’t be done,” Kasper said.

With all due respect to Kasper, widely recognized as one of the best theological minds in the church, it’s a bit of a stretch to say that something carried live on TV across much of the world was not “public.” (Perhaps what he meant is that this was not a liturgical act recognized by the church, as opposed to a private moment of devotion, however public that private moment actually was).

The pope discussed his visit to the mosque at greater length during his Dec. 6 general audience in Rome, describing it as an “initially unexpected” and “very meaningful” gesture that Divine Providence had allowed him to undertake.

He characterized what happened as “a few moments of recollection in that place of prayer,” and suggested that he had addressed himself “to the one Lord of Heaven and Earth, the merciful Father of all humanity,” deliberately using imagery that Muslims could share. He said he hoped the act would lead “all believers to recognize themselves as creatures,” and said that it was “a witness to true fraternity.”

There was no caveat about relativism, no theological commentary on the limits of such “witnesses to true fraternity.”

Why the explanatory vacuum? [BECAUSE THERE IS NOTHING TO EXPLAIN AND THEREFORE NO NEED TO EXPLAIN!] The answer, at least implicitly, seems to be the following: This pope is his own gloss.

In other words, precisely because this was Joseph Ratzinger, it is difficult to imagine that the prayer at the Blue Mosque, at least on his side, had anything to do with a relativistic approach to religious belief. It was unnecessary to slap a warning label on the event saying, “Syncretism is hazardous to your faith,” because the mere presence of Ratzinger communicated in a flash all the doctrinal caveats that form part of his understanding of such events, including his criticism of the 1986 Assisi summit.

Had this been another senior Catholic official - Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, for example, or Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, both known for more irenic views on Islam and other religions generally - fierce debate might have been unleashed about the theological meaning of the prayer, and one can imagine the Vatican issuing a “clarification” spelling out all the qualifications.

Yet this wasn’t Etchegaray or Fitzgerald. It was, instead, the very man who identified a “dictatorship of relativism” as the central challenge facing the church one day before his election to the papacy.

None of this is to suggest that the prayer didn’t come as a surprise, given Ratzinger’s background. (In fact, prior to the pope’s own comment exiting the mosque, the press corps traveling with him had been locked in fierce debate over whether to characterize what had happened as “prayer” or “meditation.”)

But it was precisely that background which, one imagines, emboldened Benedict to accept the invitation to pray, assuming that it would be seen in the context of the totality of his life and thought. ['Emboldened'? The Pope needs to be emboldened to pray? It isn't as if he had minutes to decide what he was going to do! Why isn't anyone seeing his action as something spontaneous, which is what it looked like to anyone watching - and not the result of lightning-quick 'calculations' in the mind of the Pope?]

If only Nixon could go to China, in other words, perhaps only Benedict could pray in the Blue Mosque … at least without explaining it to death. [Which everyone else, including, you, dear John, appears to be doing for him!!!]
=======================================================

By the way, I deliberately chose not to post this in the TURKEY thread, because a more general question is the point here. It's not about Turkey but about Benedict - all but saying that Benedict was being inconsistent with himself, but so what, because being who he is allows him the inconsistency!

I beg to differ most strongly. We don't need tortuous logic to 'justify' what he did, because justification in this case is even more unnecessary than explanation.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 08/12/2006 22.14]

Pope urges end to violence

Benedict pays traditional visit to Roman piazza
ROME (ANSA) - Pope Benedict prayed for an end to all violence and exploitation in the world on Friday as he paid homage to a statue of the Virgin Mary in Rome's famed Piazza di Spagna.

About 20,000 Romans and tourists gathered in the picturesque square to see the 79-year-old pontiff leading the traditional afternoon ceremony marking the Catholic feast of the Immaculate Conception.

He arrived in an open-top car, wearing red robes trimmed with white fur, and was greeted by Rome Mayor Walter Veltroni and Cardinal Camillo Ruini, his 'vicar', or stand-in, for the Rome diocese.

As the light faded, Benedict urged Christians to resist the lures of power, money and pleasure which drove people into "dishonest gain, corruption, hypocrisy, egoism and violence".

He said that modern society frequently allowed these other interests to prevail over human needs.

Without singling out any region or any political issue, he prayed that so that a better future could be built for the world's inhabitants "in respect for human dignity and rejecting all forms of violence".

The tradition of the papal pilgrimage to Piazza di Spagna was revived by Benedict's predecessor John Paul II at the start of his pontificate.

The statue and column were erected there by Pope Pius IX in 1856 after he declared the dogma of the 'immaculate conception', meaning that Jesus' mother was conceived without the stain of original sin.

It is traditional for Catholics to leave floral tributes to the Virgin Mary at the foot of the column holding her statue. Early on Friday morning, firemen scaled the 30-meaccumulated under the statue when he arrived.tre column to leave the first wreathe on the statue. The pope added a basket of roses to the many wreathes and tributes which had

I think Fr. Lombardi was telling about meditation only from one reason:
He still didn't know how muslim world will accept(it was only several minut after event, when journalists ask him) Benedict's prayer in mosque so he want to accent that Papa didn't pray any christian prayer. Fr. Lombardi is getting more careful.

From my point of view: I think prayer and meditation are synonyms. Maybe meditation is less connected with religion (we can discuss if Budhism is religion or philosophy or life style but Budhist monk apparently meditate).


I was convinced it is prayer from first moment I saw it. And I see no problem with it...Christian could pray wherever want and facing whatever side of world. It could be confusing if he put down his pectoral and become beating his head on the floor (in muslim way of prayer). Papa wanted to recognise one and the only great God we have with muslims in common. Arab catholics called our God "Allah", too, it's just arab word for him.
Prayer wasn't public...even if was transmitted to whole Galaxy...it could be public if we know exactly what he was praying.

If muslims will appreciate Papa for this prayer, it's only positive way how to show we are not crusaders as they are taught in school from very early age.

The Assisi summit is something different...they are many person who improsonate religion - like Dalai Lama (doubts if budhism is religion) or others who are worshiping animals, trees, or bad and good gods.

Monotheistic religion is something other: we are followers of some Judaism tradition and we have great respect of muslims as worshipers of One God, too.

Are people crazy, once Papa is so conservative, the second time he is enough liberal...
Why they simply didn't trust him, he is enough intelligent, studied and old to know what he does.

[Modificato da Maklara 08/12/2006 23.22]

Dear Maklara....You made me laugh so hard with that image of the Pope 'beating his head on the floor' like Muslims do when they pray! {Although, truth to say, it might not be a bad idea if the post-Vatican II Catholic generations learned some simple external gestures of prayer and worship, like kneeling! Muslims prostrate themeselves even during the five-times-daily prayer , and it's a very Oriental sign of submission and a beautiful one, because it is humbling, and we all need that.]

But I agree with you that Fr. Lombardi may have made those comments primarily to assure the Muslims it wasn't a 'Christian prayer' because he had no way of knowing immediately how the Muslims reacted to it and therefore wished to avoid any 'misunderstanding.'

Perhaps it was yet another 'Benedict effect" that all the Muslims apparently saw his gesture very simply for what it really was - as prayer and sign of respect. Which makes it all the more 'weird' that it is we Catholics who are debating what it was!

Pope Benedict himself has said several times when addressing priests and bishops that meditation - as communion with God - is prayer.

On the other hand, the prayers at Assisi were indeed public rites that were apparently designed for the occasion, therefore 'syncretic' in Cardinal Ratzinger's view, and that's why I, too, think it is wrong to compare it with the Pope's prayer in the mosque. Although, done the first time, the intention at Assisi perhaps outweighed the theological considerations, but not if it was intended to become a habitual 'inter-religious' ritual!

As for Papa Ratzinger, the only ones who are 'confounded' by him are those who insisted on seeing him only in black and white stereotypes. Now they find they have to deal with a subtle and complex mind whose ideas nevertheless translate into clear and simple words that should, in turn, translate into cleer and simple actions by those who grasp his message of faith and love, justice and peace, and abiding joy in the gift of life.

Avvenire actually carried a full story on the Assisi trip in today's issue, except I didn't check it out till now! Here is a translation:
The Pope in the footsetps
of Francis in Assisi
Di Lorenzo Rosoli



On Sunday, June 17, 2007, Benedict XVI will come to Assisi. For Ratzinger, his first pilgrimage as Pope to the places holy to the memory of the 'Poverello' [The Poor One], as the Italians call him.

"The visit takes place during the year that our diocese is dedicating to the 800th anniversary of the conversion of St. Francis," said The Archbishop of Assisi/Nocera Umbra/Gualda Tadino, Mons. Domenico Sorrentino.

"Among us, the joy and enthusiasm is great. And we were very moved that the Pope asked us to announce it on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception - as if to emphasize the great love that Francis had for Mary. Indeed the Pope will end his day in the Church of Saint Mary of the Angels. First, he will offer prayers at the Porziuncola [a historic chapel within the church - Francis founded the order here, he blessed St. Clare before she launched her order of nuns, and it was here Fracnis chose to return to die] and then meet with the youth in the Piazza of the Basilica."

So the program for the visit has been planned?
In maximum terms, yes. The first stage in the morning, the Pope will spend praying at San Damiano [church where Francis heard Christ speak to him from the Crucifix] and then at Santa Chiara [the Basilica of St. Clare]. At 10:30 he will celebrate Mass at the Basilica of St. Francis. He will meet the bishops of Umbria and the community of the Sacred Convent. In the afternoon, at the cathedral of San Ruffino, he will receive the clergy and religious orders of the diocese. We are also providing for a visit with German Capuchin monks whom Cardinal Ratzinger always visited when he came to Assisi. Finally, at 5:30 p.m., he will be at St. Mary of the Angels."

How are you preparing for this meeting with the Pope? What do you expect from the visit?
The Pope will be with us in the year we are marking thr 800th centenary of Francis's conversion - from October 2006 through Octobr 2007. This would be the first stage in a trinennium which I described in the pastoral letter "Francis, repair my house". The next two years will be dedicated to the themes of Communion and the missions.

The Pope's visit will help us rediscover - from the viewpoint of conversion to Christ and in Christ - the most authentic root of the figure and message of Francis, his vital relationship with Jesus, the Crucified One who rose from the dead.

What prompted this desire to get to the root of the Franciscan message?
Last August 31, addressing the clergy of the diocese of Albano, the Pope told them: 'Francis is and remains a model for us all, particularly for our youth. But he should not be reduced only to some aspects, even if these are important and topical, such as his love of peace or for all creatures. First of all, Francis was a converted man.' In other words, that Francis - before being appreciated as the precursor of pacifism, of environmentalism, and of dialog among peoples and religions -must be seen as alter Christus: a man who felt himself so loved by Jesus that he in turn loved Him fully without any reservations. It was a relationship of love that changed his whole life.

So that is the inspiration for the commemorative year undertaken by the Church of Assisi - a way which the Pope showed he appreciated, speaking about it not only to the clergy of Albano but on other occasions as well.

How could his visit help?
By listening carefully to the words of Benedict XVI, we can already have a foretaste of the significance of some of his acts. It is very eloquent, for example, that the program has three moments for personal prayer - as if to emphasize the centrality of a praying relationship with Christ, of interior listening, of contemplation.

How are the youth of the diocese responding to the Year of Conversion?
Between Easter and Pentecost, some 200-300 young peoople took part in a cycle of meetings held in San Damiano. For them, we organized a pilgrimage to Verna which was very well attended. Francis continues to fascinate the youth because he was 'in love' with Christ. Therefore we must be faithful to the fullness of his message and his life, without reductionism.

I looked in vain for a 'ready-made' story in English on the Pope's homage to the Immaculate Cocneption at Rome's Piazza di Spagna yesterday...It is, of course, a very Roman event, so maybe that is why the foreign media did not bother to report....


The Italian papers note that at least 20,000 Romans and tourists crowded the area yesterday for the Pope's visit - he came by open car, so people also crowded along the route to see him. This crowd was double what it was last year, the first time Benedict XVI presided at the homage, and last year's 10,000 already beat previous records!

For what the Pope said at the homage, he said it in the form of a prayer to Mary, a full translation of which is posted in HOMILIES, DISCOURSES, MESSAGES.

From Piazza di Spagna, the Pope proceeded to Santa Maria Maggiore to pray before the Marian icon there known as the Salus Populi Romani (Health of the Roman Peoples). [He did not do this last year, and I am looking for any item that says whether Paul VI or John Paul II did. The statue of the Immmaculate Conception in Piazza di Spagna is atop a free-standing pillar at the foot of the Spanish Steps - i.e., a 'lay' monument, if you will. The icon, on the other hand, is inside the largest Marian shrine in Rome.)


The Pope at the Salus Popoli Romani chapel, Santa Maria Maggiore.


P.S. Human nature being what it is, I think a factor that helped draw the crowds yesterday was a wish to see the 'gentle conqueror of Turkey' fresh from his triumph.

If the wish for him before Turkey was RITORNA VINCITOR!, well now, E RITORNATO VINCITOR {he has returned triumphant).

PPS -Maybe this part of the story will get into the foreign media:

When the Pope's car passed along via Tomaselli, where the offices of the Communist newspaper MANIFESTO are located, a load of anti-Pope flyers was dumped down from a third-floor window.

The flyers were titled 'PASTORE TEDESCO, LASCIACI IN PACS'
(German shepherd, leave us in PACS!) and contained a pro-PACS manifesto first issued on the day Benedict became Pope.

[PACS is the Italian acronym for a civil union pact proposed for homosexuals as a legal 'marriage' contract, and there is a play of words in the slogan 'Lasciaci in PACS', because PACS sounds like PAX, the Latin word for peace, i.e, Leave us in PACS, leave us in peace.]

Police quickly scooped up all the flyers and went up to the Manifesto offices to deal with the disturbance.

The Manifesto staff did the same thing when John Paul II passed through in December 2000. At that time, it was to protest against the Vatican Christmas tree that year, which came from the Austrian region whose governor, Joerg Haider, is an extreme rightist and who was going to be visiting the Pope at the Vatican.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 10/12/2006 3.30]

Pope advocates religious symbols in public places

Sat Dec 9, 5:35 PM ET

VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Religious symbols should be allowed in public places, Pope Benedict XVI told a group of Italian Catholic legal experts.

"Hostility to all forms of recognition of the political and cultural importance of religion and in particular the presence of any religious symbols in public institutions ... is not a sign of healthy secularism, but the degeneration of secularism," the pope said.

"The state cannot consider religion to be simply an individual feeling that can be confined to the private sphere," said the head of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics.

Religion "should be recognized as a common public presence," and its symbols should be allowed in offices, schools, courtrooms, hospitals, prisons and so on, the 79-year-old pontiff added.

"An areligious vision of life, thought and ethics" has led to an erroneous conception of secularism, "a term that seems to have become the essential emblem ... of modern democracy," he lamented.

The question of crucifixes and the secular nature of the Italian state has inflamed passions in the country in recent years, with parents objecting to the display of religious symbols at state schools.

All religions are considered equal under the constitution, but two decrees from the 1920s, confirmed by legislation in 1984, allow Catholic symbols in state schools.

Benedict said Saturday: "It is out of the question for the Church to indicate what political or social order is preferable, but the people should freely choose the best and most appropriate ways to organize public life."

He added: "Any direct intervention by the Church in this area would be illegitimate interference."

But, he said, the Church may "affirm and defend great values that give meaning to a person's life and safeguard its dignity."

The conservative pope, elected in April 2005, made a similar call for the display of crucifixes in public buildings last year, saying it was important that "God be visible ... and present in public life."

Political headaches bedevil
a non-statesman pope
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 9, 2006


In his encyclical Deus caritas est, Benedict XVI wrote that the church must keep its distance from “partisan strategies and programs,” but, at the same time, that the faith must play a vital role in shaping public life.

That’s a distinction easy in theory but often muddy in practice, a point brought home anew by the recent hoopla concerning Benedict XVI, Turkey, and the European Union.

The issue is likely to resurface this week, when Benedict receives Archbishop Christodoulos of Athens and All Greece, a nation where 98 percent of the population of 11 million is baptized into the Orthodox faith, and which has long been Turkey's chief regional rival.

The Dec. 13-16 visit to the Vatican, the first ever by a leader of the Orthodox Church in Greece, happens to coincide with an EU summit in Brussels which may result in a partial freeze in talks with Turkey, in part due to disputes over the island of Cyprus. In that context, the meeting between Benedict and Christodoulos will be scrutinized for potential political significance, especially given the fiercely nationalistic reputation of the Greek Orthodox Church.

That's perhaps an especially frustrating fact of life for Benedict XVI, a cerebral and spiritual figure without the same gusto for statesmanship that characterized his predecessor, John Paul II.

Cyprus has been divided between rival Greek and Turkish communities since 1974, when Turkey invaded following a failed coup staged by supporters of union with Greece. The EU has made loosening its grip on Cyprus a condition of Turkey’s membership bid.

The Turkish government in Cyprus is not recognized by the Holy See, or by any other government expect for Ankara.

During his recent trip to Turkey, Benedict distanced himself from his earlier position, expressed while still a cardinal, in opposition to Turkey’s candidacy. In Ankara he took a more neutral stance, though with the caveat that membership should be conditional upon human rights guarantees, especially religious freedom.

From Benedict’s point of view, of course, the primary context for Christodoulos’ visit is ecumenical, not political. It’s a continuation of a cautious détente between Athens and Romes that began with John Paul II’s 2001 visit to Greece. In the aftermath of that visit, the Vatican and the Greek Holy Synod have exchanged delegations, and Christodoulos himself attended the funeral Mass of Pope John Paul II in April 2005.

Try as Benedict might to pitch such events on an exclusively spiritual plane, however, politics inevitably has a way of intruding.

In November, for example, Benedict met Greek Cypriot leader Tassos Papadopoulos, who gave the pontiff an album of photographs of churches destroyed in northern Cyprus under the Turkish intervention – an act widely perceived as a bid to enlist the pope’s support for fellow Christians suffering under Muslim rule.

“Such destruction ... incredible,” Benedict uttered, according to pool reporters who covered the greeting before the pontiff and the president began their private talks. Though the Vatican had no official comment afterwards, the mere fact he received the book was interpreted in some circles as a quiet endorsement of the Greek Cypriot cause.

The Turkish newspaper Hurriyet, for example, defined the gift as a “provocative act.”

In an apparent response, during their own Nov. 28 meeting in Ankara, Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer presented the pope with another book, this one titled, “Erasing the Past: Turkish Cypriot Culture’s Religious Heritage under the Control of the Greek Cypriot Administration.”

Predictably enough, the pope’s silence once again was taken by some in the Turkish press as a form of quiet consent.

In that light, many in both Greece and Turkey no doubt will view the Christodoulos meeting with Benedict as a kind of “balancing act” vis-à-vis the pope’s recent trip to Turkey, his softened stance on EU membership, and EU debates over the fate of Cyprus.

It’s unlikely Benedict will actually say anything about Cyprus, the EU, or Greek-Turkish tensions. Yet because the Vatican generally issues only anodyne statements about the content of these meetings, all sides generally can interpret them in different ways.

Historically, the Vatican has long tried to balance its support for a negotiated settlement in Cyprus along the lines of United Nations resolutions condemning the invasion, against its desire not to take sides in ancient Turkish-Greek rivalries.

Under Pope Paul VI, the Vatican expressed “concern” over the 1974 Turkish invasion and mobilized relief efforts for displaced civilians. When the Turkish Cypriots declared independence in 1983, John Paul II upped the ante to “anguished concern,” calling for “frank dialogue” under the auspices of the international community.

As complicated as navigating the shoals of Turkish-Greek tensions are for a pope dedicated to improving relations both with Muslims and with the Orthodox, it may be that ecclesiastical politics prove equally thorny when Christodoulos arrives in Rome on Wednesday.

The Greek Orthodox traditionally see themselves as custodians of the Orthodox faith in its most pure form, and hence have been especially suspicious of Rome’s ecumenical overtures. When John Paul II visited Greece in 2001, for example, more than 2,000 Orthodox monks and activists marched in Athens in protest ahead of the trip, and some Orthodox monasteries rung mourning bells while the pope was on Greek soil.

John Paul was forced to leave behind a member of his normal entourage, Cardinal Ignace Moussa Daoud, Prefect of the Congregation for Eastern Churches, because Daoud is a member of the Syriac Rite and hence considered a “uniate” by the Greeks – in effect, an Orthodox who “sold out” by entering into union with Rome.

In a meeting in the archbishop’s palace in Athens during that 2001 visit, Christodoulos – who, ironically, is known as something of an ecumenical “dove” on his home turf – delivered a tongue-whipping to John Paul the likes of which few popes have ever heard in person.

He informed the pope that “a large part of the church of Greece opposes your presence here.” He said the frosty welcome arose from the “unbrotherly behavior of the western Christian world” toward the Orthodox. Christodoulos said that “open wounds” remain alive in Greek memory, such as “the destructive mania of the Crusaders” as well as the “unlawful proselytizing” of the Eastern Catholic churches, made up of believers who follow Orthodox rites but profess loyalty to Rome.

“Indeed, on many occasions in our history, our people bitterly noted that the powerful church of Rome denied it during difficult moments,” Christodoulos said. For Christodoulos, the bottom line was that Orthodoxy had an apology coming.

He didn’t have long to wait.

“For occasions past and present, when sons and daughters of the Catholic church have sinned by action or omission against their Orthodox brothers and sisters, may the Lord grant us the forgiveness we beg of him,” the pope said, speaking in a halting English. The instant the words left his lips, Christodoulos burst into strong applause, joined by other Orthodox bishops in the room.

That gesture of contrition played to widely positive reviews, and opened the door to a thawing of historical tensions.

Yet Greek resentments of Rome are far from resolved, as witnessed by the fact that just this past May, Christodoulos’ own Holy Synod voted 42-15 against his intention to go to Rome to meet the pope.

It was only as Benedict’s trip to Turkey loomed, including his planned meeting with Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew I, that Christodoulos was able to persuade the Synod that the Orthodox in Greece should not be left behind.

While in Rome, Christodoulos will receive a section of the chain traditionally believed to have bound St. Paul from Benedict XVI in a special ceremony at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls. St. Paul has special significance for the Greek Orthodox, since it was at the Acropolis in Athens that the apostle preached his famous sermon on the “unknown God.”

Gifts of relics have become an important instrument of papal outreach to the Orthodox world. In 2004, for example, John Paul II returned relics of St. Gregory the Theologian and St. John Chrysostom, both fourth century theologians who had also served as Patriarchs of Constantinople, to Bartholomew I in a ceremony in St. Peter’s Basilica.

During Benedict’s Turkey trip, the Patriarchate of Constantinople distributed a commemorative DVD marking the return of the relics, which had been in the possession of the Catholic Church since they were brought to Rome following the sack of Constantinople by Crusaders in 1204.

The Lateran University, known informally as “the pope’s university” because of its location at the Basilica of St. John Lateran, will also confer an honorary degree upon Christodoulos.

While the visit of Christodoulos is considered a significant achievement for Benedict’s aspiration to promote Christian unity, few expect any concrete new breakthroughs to result quickly.

I'm glad at least one English news service has reported this, even if it is only a partial report on what the Holy Father told a convention of Italian Catholic Jurists Saturday at the Vatican. I have posted a translation of the full Papal text in HOMILIES, DISCOURSES, MESSAGES. There have been quite a few good reaction articles in the Italian press, because, of course, it is in Italy, where the very right of the Pope to speak about public issues is being questioned all the time.

His address to the jurists was a very firm and emphatic restatement of what the Holy Father calls 'healthy secularity', a forceful follow-up to ideas he had expressed in Verona last October....

Translation note: The Italian terms are 'laicita' and 'laicismo'. I choose to translate 'laicity' as 'secularity', which is 'the quality of being secular', and 'laicismo' as 'secularism', the ideology of secularity. This AFP article uses the term secularism for both.

VATICAN CITY, Dec. 9 (AFP) - Religious symbols should be allowed in public places, Pope Benedict XVI told a group of Italian Catholic legal experts.

"Hostility to all forms of recognition of the political and cultural importance of religion and in particular the presence of any religious symbols in public institutions ... is not a sign of healthy secularism [laicita], but the degeneration of secularism [laicismo]," the pope said.

"The state cannot consider religion to be simply an individual feeling that can be confined to the private sphere," said the head of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics.

Religion "should be recognized as a common public presence," and its symbols should be allowed in offices, schools, courtrooms, hospitals, prisons and so on, the 79-year-old pontiff added.

"An areligious vision of life, thought and ethics" has led to an erroneous conception of secularism [laicita], "a term that seems to have become the essential emblem ... of modern democracy," he lamented.

The question of crucifixes and the secular nature of the Italian state has inflamed passions in the country in recent years, with parents objecting to the display of religious symbols at state schools.

All religions are considered equal under the constitution, but two decrees from the 1920s, confirmed by legislation in 1984, allow Catholic symbols in state schools.

Benedict said Saturday: "It is out of the question for the Church to indicate what political or social order is preferable, but the people should freely choose the best and most appropriate ways to organize public life."

He added: "Any direct intervention by the Church in this area would be illegitimate interference."

But, he said, the Church may "affirm and defend great values that give meaning to a person's life and safeguard its dignity."

The conservative pope, elected in April 2005, made a similar call for the display of crucifixes in public buildings last year, saying it was important that "God be visible ... and present in public life."


==============================================================

An editorial yesterday in the Italian newspaper Il Tempo stands up for the Pope. Here is a translation:

Fortunately, we have the Pope:
A lesson in respect and civility

There are those who are indignant because the Pope defends religious values including respect for religious symbols in public places - a crucifix in a school or a hospital, a creche at the entrance to a shelter, or in a plaza, even in our homes.

But they appear to ignore that anything amiss when the President of Iran pays for research that would show Hitler only killed 4000 Jews, not 6 million.

They complain of interference when the Pope stresses the central role of the natural fmaily in society but say nothing when the leader of Hamas threatens, "It will be worse for you if you do not follow the way of Muhammed."

They point fingers or raise their eyebrows mockingly when the Pope invites us to consider that the search for the reality of God is not incompatible the search for earthly reality - to give sense not only to why we exist but also how we must exist.

We must defend Benedict XVI from these solons of the bourgeois rearguard salons, even as the Pope launches a challenge of modernization to nations like Turkey where a common public sense of the reality of God may help show the way, perhaps the only way, to a dialog of peace and brotherhood.

Science alone produces scientism, secularity alone generates secularism - as well as that secularization which was for centuries considered an advance for men, peoples and states, but has now turned against itself to produce alienation among the citizenry, a loss of identity among peoples, and nothing but weakness, inertia and infinite fear for states.

Enlightened reason, Benedict XVI tells us, gave us a sacred principle, a unique indisputable value - the individiual right to express onself without limit as long as doing so does not violate the right of others.

Unfortunately, many forget that these days. But not our philosopher-theologian Pope. He gives us a lesson all the time. To stand up, respect and be respected.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 11/12/2006 14.53]

Vatican Information Services, reporting on the Vatican press conference earlier today about the sarcophagus of St. Paul, did not think the following news worthy of a separate story, or a sidebar at the very least, although it mentioned it in passing in its report of the main story.

Here is a translation of APCOM's report:

HENCEFORTH THEY ARE
PAPAL BASILICAS,
NOT PATRIARCHAL
VATICAN CITY, Dec. 11 (Apcom) - The four major basilicas of Rome - St. Peter's, St. John Lateran, St. Mary Major and St. Paul's-outside-tne-Walls - will heretofore be known as 'papal basilicas' rather than 'patriarchal basilicas.'

Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, arch-priest of the basilica of St. Paul's, announced this at the press conference this morning about the unearthing of what is believed to be St. Paul's original sarcophagus (under the main altar of the church that was built over what tradition had established as Paul's burial place).

Cardinal Montezemolo said "The Pope decided to change the designation because all four basilicas have a 'papal altar', so-called because they were consecrated by Popes and its use is reserved to them. Only the Pope, with the basilica's arch-priest, can use the papal altars."
===============================================================
Lella in the main forum makes the very relevant observation that
the decision may also have to do with the fact that the Pope has renounced the title "Patriarch of the Occident".

I find that eminently possible. One of the reasons for giving up the title was to avoid having the Roman Pontiff carry the same honorific that distinguishes the heads of the Eastern Churches - a move by Benedict XVI to soften historical resentments against the head of the Roman Church. As if to say, "Look, I am not your competition!"

That he has changed the designation of the Roman basilicas to avoid using the adjective 'patriarchal' comes on the heels of his ecumenical visit to Bartholomew I in Istanbul and on the eve of the visit to him of Christodoulos, the Patriarch of Athens and Primate of the Greek Orthodox Church.

===============================================================

TWO LINKS FROM ST. PAUL'S CHAIN
FOR PATRIARCH CHRISTODOULOS
Another APCOM news item says Cardinal Montezemole has announced that two links from the 'chain of St. Paul's' kept in a reliquary at St. Paul-outside-the-Walls will be given to Patriarch Christodoulos at a special ceremony in the basilica on Thursday afternoon. Christodoulos will be in Rome Dec. 13-16.

The Cardinal explained that the Greek Orthodox Church had originally requested from John Paul II a relic of St. Paul, but inasmuch as the tomb had not been found at the time, the Pope promised to give two links from the chain that tradition says bound St. Paul during one of his last captivities.



'ECCLESIA DEI' IN PLENARY SESSION TOMORROW
ABOUT LIBERALIZING THE TRADITIONAL MASS
APCOM picks up a French report that says the 'Ecclesia Dei' Commission, which is the Pontifical committee in charge of discussing practical matters affecting the universal Church as a whole, will have its first plenary session tomorrow to discuss liberalization of the traditional Mass.

The French agency I.media reported that Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, Archbishoop of Bordeaux and president of the French bishops conference arrived in Rome to take part in the session.

At the annual meeting of the French Bishops last November, some of them expressed their concerns about reviving the traditional Mass in any way.

It's pope vs. pop star
on Africa, Weigel says
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 12, 2006


It’s pope against pop star, according to noted Catholic writer George Weigel, when it comes to poverty and chronic underdevelopment in Africa.

In a recent Rome lecture in which he addressed Benedict XVI’s encyclical Deus caritas est, Weigel contrasted the approach to Africa associated with the rock star Bono – which, Weigel said, draws a flawed distinction between charity and justice – with the pope’s insistence that no program of state-sponsored assistance or massive philanthropic endeavor can ever replace individual acts of compassion.

In so doing, Weigel challenged popular perceptions of an oddfellows alliance between Bono and the papacy on issues of international poverty in general, and Africa in particular.

Weigel noted that when Bono, of the Irish band U2, was named Time magazine’s Person of the Year in 2005 around the same time Benedict’s encyclical was released, the pop star made the following comments:

“And finally, it’s not about charity after all, is it? It’s about justice. Let me repeat this: It’s not about charity, it’s about justice. And that’s too bad. Because you’re good at charity. Americans, like the Irish, are good at it. We like to give, and we give a lot, even those who can’t afford it. But justice is a higher standard. Africa makes a fool of our idea of justice; it makes a farce of our idea of equality. It mocks our pieties, it doubts our concern, it questions our commitment.”
[Did someone think to ask Bono what exsctly he means by his words 'chairty' and 'justice'? Is not justice a consequence of charity, if this is understood to mean Christian charity which is loving God and therefore loving your fellowmen as you love yourself?]

Weigel, who spoke at a Dec. 12 conference sponsored by the Acton Institute, an American Catholic group focused on the intersection between economics and virtue, took issue with that analysis, while acknowledging the nobility of Bono’s moral concern.

“Hundreds of billions, perhaps trillions, of aid dollars have been squandered by despotic African governments or stolen by kleptocratic African government officials over the past forty years,” Weigel said.

“Yes, Africa is in crisis and could easily fall off the edge of history into a continental oblivion that would forever scar the conscience of humanity,” he said. “But to suggest that the answer to Africa’s crisis of crises is to set justice against charity and to privilege governmental aid programs over other forms of aid is to be willfully blind to the history of the late twentieth century. It also suggests a sorry ignorance of the fact that, in Africa, only non-governmental organizations (and especially churches) have shown themselves capable of promoting the kind of changed behavior that drives down the incidence of AIDS.”

By way of contrast, Weigel argued that Deus caritas est, while not strictly speaking a social encyclical, nevertheless offers a more convincing defense of “retail charity at the personal level."

Weigel quoted Benedict: “Love – caritas – will always prove necessary, even in the most just society,” the pope wrote in Deus caritas est. “There is no ordering of the state so just that it can eliminate the need for a service of love. Whoever wants to eliminate love is preparing to eliminate man as such.”

Weigel thus contended, in line with this observation, that the solution to problems such as the development crisis in Africa is actually more charity, not less.

“Setting justice against charity has shown itself to be a prescription for injustice and a guaranteed method for muffling the sense of fellow-feeling and obligation that gives rise to charity in all its forms, large and small,” Weigel said.

Weigel's effort to draw a sharp distinction between Bono and Benedict contrasts with the affinity Bono obviously felt for the late John Paul II. Bono met Pope John Paul at the pope's summer residence in Castel Gandolfo in September 1999, as part of the Jubilee 2000 campaign for debt relief. John Paul praised Bono on that occassion for his advocacy, describing the growing gap between rich and poor as the greatest threat to humanity.

John Paul also playfully donned Bono's trademark sunglasses, producing one of the most iconic photographs of his pontificate.

Bono later described John Paul II as "a street fighter and a wily campaigner on behalf of the world's poor," saying, "We would never have gotten the debts of 23 countries completely canceled without him."

Bono also memorably defined John Paul as "history's first funky pontiff."

In his Rome lecture, Weigel put Benedict’s treatment of charity in the context of the development of Roman Catholic social teaching since the 19th century, especially the social doctrine of Pope John Paul II.

At the dawn of the 21st century, Weigel argued, there were three proposals for the future with enough clout to have a worldwide impact: the “pragmatic utilitarianism” of Europe and North America, a resurgent Islam, and the social doctrine of the Catholic Church.

“One does not risk a charge of special pleading by suggesting that the course of the twenty-first century and beyond will be determined in no small part by the answer to the question, how will each of these proposals shape the emerging global culture?” Weigel said.

Weigel, who is sometimes identified as a “neo-conservative,” laid out the core elements of Catholic social theory as it has evolved since the 19th century in terms of four principles:
• Personalism – Reflection on the just society begins with the human rights of persons, not with the collective.
• Common Good – Each person should exercise his or her freedom in ways that benefit the general welfare of society, not just self-aggrandizement.
• Subsidiarity – Decision-making in society should be left at the lowest possible level.
• Solidarity – Society must be more than contractual, but an expression of mutual participation in a common enterprise. Weigel argues that this principle was the contribution of Pope John Paul II.

Weigel suggested that in Deus caritas est, Benedict XVI entered a burgeoning debate in Western culture between “charity” and “philanthropy,” with the latter usually understood as a systematic and large-scale effort not merely to respond to crisis situations, but to resolve their underlying causes. Weigel cites in this regard a recent Business Week interview with Steve Gunderson, the new Chief Executive Officer of the Council on Foundations, the trade organization of American philanthropic bodies.

Weigel’s underlying suggestion is that Catholic social doctrine tends to favor private initiatives on a personal scale as the best way to tackle social ills.

French Professor Jean-Yves Naudet, President of the Association of Catholic Economists, also addressed the Acton Institute event. He argued that Catholic social doctrine, especially the encyclicals of John Paul II, remedies an important deficit in secular economic theory, which he described as insufficient attention to anthropology – the question of who is the human person around which economic theories pivot.

Had economists been attuned to the anthropological dimension of their discipline, Naudet argued, they would never have been seduced by Marxism, premised as it was on unsustainable assumptions about the priority of the collective over the individual.

“John Paul II and Benedict XVI have not been afraid to integrate the contributions of the economic sciences into their own reflections,” Naudet concluded. “It is time that economists in turn integrate the insights of the church, and in particular, of these two great popes, into their thought.”

===============================================================

At this writing, the actual Message for World Peace Day 2007 is not yet posted on the Vatican website, but portions of it are quoted in a Vatican bulletin about a press conference today about it, at which Cardinal Martino cited significant passages.

Pope Benedict XVI:
World peace and
the right to life go together
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
New York
Posted on Dec 12, 2006


Advocating a “true integral humanism,” Pope Benedict XVI today insisted that defense of the right to life on issues such as abortion and euthanasia is inextricably linked to peaceful resolution of global conflicts such as the recent crisis in Lebanon, or the “scourge of terrorism.”

The common thread, the pope argued, is respect for the natural moral law, as opposed to a “relativistic” conception of rights which, Benedict argued, can lead to weakening or abandoning those rights, thus making violence possible.

The pope’s comments came in his annual message for the World Day of Peace, released this morning in a Vatican news conference. The Vatican marks the “Day of Peace” each year on January 1, a date selected by Pope Paul VI on the grounds that as the beginning of the New Year, it carries universal, rather than specifically religious, significance.

Perhaps unsurprisingly for a pope who memorably defined a “dictatorship of relativism” as the central crisis facing the church, Benedict warned against superficially tolerant positions, such as a "relativistic conception of the person," which, he believes, turn out to be profoundly dangerous.

“Many of our contemporaries actually deny the existence of a specific human nature and thus open the door to the most extravagant interpretations of what essentially constitutes a human being,” the pope wrote.

“A ‘weak’ vision of the person, which would leave room for every conception, even the most bizarre, only apparently favors peace,” Benedict wrote. “In reality, it hinders authentic dialogue and opens the way to authoritarian impositions, ultimately leaving the person defenceless and, as a result, easy prey to oppression and violence."

Benedict argued that natural law, and the presupposition of objective truth which underlies it, provides the basis for real dialogue across cultures about peace. He quoted in this regard the Indian sage Mahatma Gandhi: “The Ganges of rights flows from the Himalaya of duties.”

Picking up a theme from his Sept. 12 address at the University of Regensburg, which set off waves of protest in the Muslim world because of the impression that the pope had linked Islam with violence, Benedict again insisted upon the centrality of reason in efforts to build a culture of peace. It is reason, he wrote, which opens the mind to the natural law.

“The norms of the natural law should not be viewed as externally imposed decrees, as restraints upon human freedom,” he wrote. “Rather, they should be welcomed as a call to carry out faithfully the universal divine plan inscribed in the nature of human beings.”

Although it has become customary in Catholicism for “pro-life” and “peace and justice” activists often to move in different circles, Benedict insisted that the two causes are inseparable.

“Abortion and embryonic experimentation constitute a direct denial of that attitude of acceptance of others which is indispensable for establishing lasting relationships of peace,” the pope wrote.

Along with the right to life, Benedict also identified the right to religious freedom as a core concern.

“Speaking of Christians in particular … in some States they are actually persecuted, and even recently tragic cases of ferocious violence have been recorded,” the pope wrote.

The pope also addressed discrimination against women.

“I think of the exploitation of women who are treated as objects, and of the many ways that a lack of respect is shown for their dignity,” the pope wrote. “I also think — in a different context — of the mindset persisting in some cultures, where women are still firmly subordinated to the arbitrary decisions of men, with grave consequences for their personal dignity and for the exercise of their fundamental freedoms.”

In another section of his message, Benedict argued that environmental concern and peace-making are naturally related.

“Experience shows that disregard for the environment always harms human coexistence, and vice versa,” he wrote. In this context, Benedict warned of an increasingly serious problem of energy supplies, especially for developing nations.

Benedict also said that terrorism demands new reflection on the moral dimensions of war.

“War always represents a failure for the international community and a grave loss for humanity,” the pope wrote. “When, despite every effort, war does break out, at least the essential principles of humanity and the basic values of all civil coexistence must be safeguarded; norms of conduct must be established that limit the damage as far as possible and help to alleviate the suffering of civilians and of all the victims of conflicts.”

Perhaps referring to recent debates surrounding Iran, the pope also condemned “the desire shown by some states to acquire nuclear weapons.”

In a comment that American Catholics may hear in light of the recent sexual abuse crisis, Benedict XVI opened his message with a reference to the protection of children.

The pope said his message was motivated in part “out of concern for children, especially those whose future is compromised by exploitation and the malice of unscrupulous adults.”

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 12/12/2006 15.22]

Papal peace message stresses human rights even when terrorism strikes

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Even when faced with a potential terrorist attack or in the midst of war, basic human rights must be respected, Pope Benedict XVI said in his message for World Peace Day 2007.

"Peace is based on respect for the rights of all," the pope said in his message for the Jan. 1 commemoration.

The message, "The Human Person, the Heart of Peace," was sent to heads of state around the world and was released Dec. 12 at a Vatican press conference.

The pope's message included prayers for peace in war-torn countries, such as Lebanon; special concern for child victims of violence; a condemnation of continued nuclear proliferation; and concern over the potential for violent conflicts over energy resources.

The basis of any hope for peace, the pope said, is a recognition that each human person is created in the image and likeness of God and, therefore, endowed with a dignity and with rights that cannot be usurped by anyone.

Most countries around the world have adopted the tenets of international humanitarian law, recognizing that it applies in situations of conflict as well as in peacetime, he said.

"Unfortunately, to say nothing of past cases, this has not been consistently implemented in certain recent situations of war," he said.

Specifically citing the July war in Lebanon between Hezbollah militias and Israel, Pope Benedict said the duty to protect, assist and avoid involving the civilian population "was largely ignored."

"The heart-rending situation in Lebanon and the new shape of conflicts, especially since the terrorist threat unleashed completely new forms of violence, demand that the international community reaffirm international humanitarian law and apply it to all present-day situations of armed conflict," the pope said.

While recognizing the difficulties posed by the threat of terrorism, Pope Benedict said countries must conduct "a profound reflection on the ethical limits restricting the use of modern methods of guaranteeing internal security."

Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, told reporters at the Vatican Dec. 12 that the global fight against terrorism can be seen as "the Fourth World War. The Cold War was the third."

He continued, "But this war does not have the parameters of the wars we experienced in history. This must push countries to ask, 'What should we do?' and to develop regulations" that will provide security while guaranteeing respect for human rights.

In his message, Pope Benedict also called for "a vision of the person untainted by ideological and cultural prejudices or by political and economic interests which can instill hatred and violence."

And he urged members of religious communities and their leaders to renew their commitment to dialogue and to denouncing "conceptions of God that would encourage intolerance and recourse to violence against others."

"War in God's name is never acceptable," the pope said.

Throughout the document, Pope Benedict called for a universal recognition that basic human rights are God-given or natural; when an individual or a society decides it can determine who will enjoy which rights, both human dignity and peace are threatened, he said.

"As far as the right to life is concerned, we must denounce its widespread violation in our society," the pope said.

"Alongside the victims of armed conflicts, terrorism and the different forms of violence, there are the silent deaths caused by hunger, abortion, experimentation on human embryos and euthanasia," he said.

"How can we fail to see in all this an attack on peace?" Pope Benedict asked.

The pope also condemned as a violation of human dignity, and a threat to peace, situations in which individuals are not free to practice their religious faith, either because a national regime imposes one religion on its residents or because a "systematic cultural denigration of religious beliefs" encourages people to hide their faith or limits their ability to express religious beliefs in public.

In addition, he said, violations of "the natural equality of all persons" also threaten peace.

Obviously, he said, the fact that so many of the world's people have no access to the essentials needed for life, including food, water, shelter and health "lies at the root of violent reactions and thus inflicts a terrible wound on peace."

But also, the pope said, "inadequate consideration for the condition of women helps to create instability in the fabric of society," especially when women are exploited or "where women are still firmly subordinated to the arbitrary decisions of men with grave consequences for their personal dignity and for the exercise of their fundamental freedoms."

"There can be no illusion of a secure peace until these forms of discrimination are also overcome, since they injure the personal dignity impressed by the creator upon every human being," Pope Benedict said.

- - -

Editor's Note: The full text of the papal message is available at www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/messages/peace/do...
hf_ben-xvi_mes_20061208_xl-world-day-peace_en.html.

[I think Teresa already posted the bottom part of this article but the top part looks new and, besides, the more good stuff we hear about Papa the better.]


“Habemus Papam.” Twenty Months Later, a Portrait

Benedict XVI doesn’t seek applause, he doesn’t harangue the crowds, but he’s still extremely popular. He himself has explained his secret: it is “obedience to the truth, not to the dictatorship of popular opinion”

by Sandro Magister

ROMA, December 12, 2006 – Twenty months after his election as pope, Benedict XVI has become a case study on a worldwide level.

One indication along these lines is found in the portrait in words and images given in the book “Benedict XVI, the Dawn of a New Papacy,” recently published in both Italian and English.

The volume is published by White Star, a publishing group associated with the National Geographic Society.

Its creators are a great Italian photographer, Gianni Giansanti, already famous for his photographs of John Paul II, and the Rome bureau chief of “Time” magazine, Jeff Israely.

Israely writes, in part:

“The actions of his predecessor amazed the entire world. Benedict XVI, however, makes news with the force of his prose. But his words do not represent a pure intellectual exercise: they are a manifestation of his faith and humanity. In the messenger, the message is made visible.”

This is the same view that was printed in “L’espresso” in a portrait of pope Joseph Ratzinger published on the eve of his trip to Turkey:

“John Paul II dominated the stage. Benedict XVI offers the crowds his bare words. But he is careful to direct attention toward something beyond himself.”

But much more than this must be said and specified, in order to grasp the distinctive profile of the current pope.

Here follows the portrait of Benedict XVI published in edition no. 47 of “L’espresso,” November 30, 2006:


Benedict XVI, a Pope Armed with “Purity”

by Sandro Magister


The numbers speak. Benedict XVI is the most popular pope in history, if by people one understands those whom he draws like a magnet to St. Peter’s Square each Sunday for the Angelus and each Wednesday for the general audience, from Rome and from all over the world.

Attendance is routinely more than twice that seen by his predecessor, John Paul II, who in his turn had shattered all the records. But the most amazing thing is the relationship between the demand and what is on offer. The winning product that Benedict XVI offers to the crowds is made of nothing but his plain words.

At the Angelus, two times out of three pope Joseph Ratzinger explains the Gospel of that Sunday’s Mass to an audience that includes people who don’t go to church every week – and some who don’t go at all. He explains this with simple words, but these demand and receive attention. There is an impressive silence in St. Peter’s Square when he is speaking. And at the end of the very short homily, he immediately begins the Angelus prayer, without even a momentary pause. This is his effective means of preventing an outbreak of applause. This does happen, but at the end of the entire ceremony, at the moment of the greetings in the various languages.

As pope, Benedict XVI doesn’t give an inch to the preconceptions that were formed about him as a cardinal. He doesn’t thunder condemnations, he doesn’t hurl anathemas. He reasons staunchly, but serenely. His criticisms against modernity or against the “pathologies” that he sees even within the Church are fully elaborated. That is part of the reason why he has practically silenced Catholic progressivism: not because this has turned friendly toward him, but because it is not able to reply to him with arguments of similar persuasive power.

Benedict XVI does not at all demonstrate a sense of inadequacy in comparison with his predecessor. He doesn’t imitate him in any way. John Paul II didn’t so much walk as process solemnly. Pope Ratzinger goes straight to the finish with rapid strides. John Paul II dominated the stage. Benedict XVI is careful to direct attention toward something beyond himself.

The nighttime vigil with the million young people who came to Germany in August of 2005 remains a memorable occasion. It was the first major media event that the new pope had faced. For minutes on end that seemed like an eternity, Benedict XVI remained in silence, on his knees, in front of the consecrated host placed upon the altar. But this didn’t put the young people ill at ease. It did ruffle the television directors and commentators, who didn’t know any longer what they could say or do to fill up the “void” with which the pope had deflated all the built-up hoopla.

He is the first pope theologian in the Church’s history. But he knows how to teach theology even to ordinary people – and even to children. One of the communication devices that he has come up with is the question-and-answer session with the most varied audiences. He did this even with the tens of thousands of children who had recently received first communion, 9 years old on average, gathered in St. Peter’s Square. A boy asked him: “My catechist told me that Jesus is present in the Eucharist. But how? I can’t see him!” The reply: “Yes, we don’t see him, but there are many things we don’t see that exist and are essential. For example, we don’t see our faculty of reasoning. But we have reason all the same.”

Benedict XVI opened a daring maneuver with the theme of reason. It was upon the relationship between faith and reason that he centered the address that became the most famous and controversial of the first year and a half of his pontificate: the “lectio magistralis” he delivered at the university of Regensburg on September 12, 2006.

It isn’t a stretch to say that Ratzinger is a herald of the Enlightenment, because he himself has declared that he wants to take up the defense of Enlightenment principles in an age in which few remain to defend reason. Those who expected to find in the former head of the former Holy Office a fideist paladin of dogma have been given their just deserts. For him, it is not only Jerusalem, but it is also the Athens of the Greek philosophers that is at the origin of the Christian faith.

Benedict XVI is not afraid of leveling severe criticism against the religions, beginning with Christianity, precisely in the name of reason. He wants a mutual relationship of oversight and purification to be established between reason and religion. He dedicated two thirds of his lecture in Regensburg to criticizing the phases in which Christianity detached itself from its rational foundations.

The lecture in Regensburg is not the only text that Benedict XVI has written personally, without listening to the experts who certainly would have expurgated these writings. Even the address on the Holocaust that he delivered in Auschwitz and Birkenau was entirely his. And this, too, promptly drew disagreements and polemics – political and theological, from Jews, secularists, and Christians. As pope, Ratzinger often acts with a recklessness that no one expected from him.

And he explained the reason for his speaking “in season and out of season” last October 6, in a homily to the thirty scholars of the international theological commission:

“In this context, a beautiful phrase from the First Letter of St Peter springs to my mind. It is from verse 22 of the first chapter. The Latin goes like this: ‘Castificantes animas nostras in oboedentia veritatis’. Obedience to the truth must 'purify' our souls and thus guide us to upright speech and upright action. In other words, speaking in the hope of being applauded, governed by what people want to hear out of obedience to the dictatorship of current opinion, is considered to be a sort of prostitution: of words and of the soul. The ‘purity’ to which the Apostle Peter is referring means not submitting to these standards, not seeking applause, but rather, seeking obedience to the truth. And I think that this is the fundamental virtue for the theologian, this discipline of obedience to the truth, which makes us, although it may be hard, collaborators of the truth, mouthpieces of truth, for it is not we who speak in today's river of words, but it is the truth which speaks in us, who are really purified and made chaste by obedience to the truth. So it is that we can truly be harbingers of the truth.”

That’s just how Benedict XVI is. He feels himself to be so closely girded with this armor of “purity” that he fears no contamination. He scandalized some when he received in private audience at Castel Gandolfo the combative Oriana Fallaci. But one year later he wanted to meet also with Henry Kissinger, the most realistic of the followers if Realpolitik. The prince of the anti-Roman theologians, Hans Küng, has been another of his surprise guests. Benedict XVI simply isn’t the type to be frightened by a dispute, a satire, or a fatwa.

_____________

Different popes a reflection of different periods

Updated 12/11/2006
By Eric J. Lyman, Special for USA TODAY

VATICAN CITY — Like John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI made a visit to Turkey the main foreign policy initiative of his second year as leader of the world's Catholics. And like John Paul did, Benedict is making Brazil a priority. He plans a visit to the largest Catholic nation in May.

Beyond such similarities, the pontiffs' leadership styles diverge.

John Paul preferred grand overtures and worked the crowds using his personal appeal, while Benedict wields his intellect.

These differences may have more to do with the changing times than the individuals, says Gilberto Mazzoleni, an author and religious history professor at Rome's Sapienza University. "I think we are seeing more than a difference between two men," he says. "We are seeing a difference between two eras."

Even the crowds that gather to see the pope are different. Many of the pilgrims who gather in St. Peter's Square expressed affection for John Paul and respect for the intellect of his successor.

"People here loved and adored John Paul, but they have a profound respect for Benedict," said Alfred Marshall, 38, a teacher from Philadelphia who has been living in Rome for three years.

"I think the faithful came to listen to Pope John Paul," said Lorenzo Cagliari, 50, a deacon in Ostia, a seaside town 20 miles from Rome. "And they come to learn from Pope Benedict."

Though some of the differences are tied to the times, Benedict also may be approaching his papacy with a greater sense of urgency. He took over the Holy See as a somewhat frail man of 78. John Paul was 58 when he was elected pope.

"Benedict has a sense that there is a need for realpolitik at the Vatican," says Sandro Magister, a veteran Vatican observer with the Italian newsweekly L'Espresso. "In the context of the world today, the church feels it is called upon to act."

Church issues

There is little difference between Benedict and John Paul when it comes to church doctrine. For example, there is no space between them on the need to maintain a celibate clergy, though they handled the issue differently.

Renegade Archbishop Emanuel Milingo of Zambia tested both on that issue. In 2001, Milingo married a Korean woman in a group ceremony of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. He also threatened to set up a rival branch of the Catholic Church that would let priests marry. John Paul's response was typical of his style: Milingo was called to the Vatican and forgiven.

Milingo bucked the Vatican again in September, when he ordained four married American men as bishops — an act that meant automatic excommunication. In keeping with his more academic, policy-oriented approach, Benedict called a summit of 20 church leaders to reiterate the church stance on celibacy.

"Benedict focused on the issue, the problem and not the specific situation," Magister says.

During his trip to Turkey in 1979, John Paul called on Christians and Muslims to "seek ties of friendship with other believers who invoke the name of a single God." Benedict's recent four-day visit to Turkey had a similar theme.

John Paul underlined his point with a typically grand gesture: He kissed the Quran. During his visit, Benedict stuck to a program that included discussions with political and religious leaders, including Ali Bardakoglu, the country's director of religious affairs and one of the pope's biggest critics after Benedict's comments in September suggested a link between Islam and violence.

Although Benedict, like John Paul, visited sites holy to Muslims and Christians, his trip became one of reconciliation and discussion among faiths rather than one of symbolism.

Political approach

Benedict's more academic style was evident in September, when he stirred controversy by quoting a Byzantine emperor who called the prophet Mohammed's teachings "evil and inhuman." The Vatican said the speech was intended as a lecture on violence driven by religion.

Benedict sought to assuage the anger that swept across the Muslim world, saying the quote did not reflect his opinion, but he did not apologize. He said his speech was meant to start a dialogue to heal the growing breach between Christianity and Islam. His papacy is likely to continue to deal with that rift and other such divisions in global society.

"All through the Christian world, we see that politics is becoming more secular," Mazzoleni says. "And so it stands to reason that the church could seek to compensate by becoming more political."

Over the first 19 months of Benedict's papacy, the Vatican has waded into debates on issues such as women wearing the veil in Christian society (Benedict says they should follow local, secular laws). The Holy See has criticized the Chinese ordination of Catholic bishops not approved by the Vatican, sexual abuse in the church and human trafficking. It also has called for denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

Benedict "was selected in part because he is the right man for these times," professor Mazzoleni says. "For what it is worth, I think future popes will be more like Pope Benedict than like Pope John Paul."

Pope sounds ecological note in World Peace Day address

by Martine Nouaille
Dec. 12, 2006
AFP

In a message for world peace, Pope Benedict XVI singled out energy supplies as a cause of conflict and also took a swipe at euthanasia, abortion and stem-cell research.

"The destruction of the environment, its improper or selfish use, and the violent hoarding of the earth's resources cause grievance, conflicts and wars, precisely because they are the consequence of inhumane concept of development," Benedict said in his annual address ahead of World Peace Day on January 1.

"What injustices and conflicts will be provoked by the race of energy sources? And what will be the reaction of those who are excluded from this race?" the pope asked.

The destruction of the environment, its improper or selfish use, and the violent hoarding of the earth's resources cause grievances, conflicts and wars, precisely because they are the consequences of an inhumane concept of development, the German-born pontiff said.

But in his 20-page "reflection" text entitled "The Human Person, the Heart of Peace", the pope offered no compromise on issues related to procreation and voluntary death.

The right to life "is not subject to the power of man," he said.

"Alongside the victims of armed conflicts, terrorism and the different forms of violence there are the silent deaths caused by hunger, abortion, experimentation on human embryos and euthanasia," the pope said.

"How can we fail to see in all this an attack on peace? Abortion and embryonic experimentation constitute a direct denial of that attitude of acceptance of others which is indispensable for establishing lasting relationships of peace."

The Netherlands -- where 2,000 cases were recorded in 2005 -- and Belgium legalized euthanasia in 2002 and pressure has been growing in many European countries to follow suit.

And right under Benedict's nose, a Rome court was due on Tuesday to examine the appeal of a 60-year-old Italian with muscular dystrophy who has been kept alive on an artificial respirator since 1997.

The pontiff also insisted on the importance of religious freedom as a critical factor for peace, pointing specifically to "some countries" in which Christians were persecuted.

He condemned what he called the transformation of religion "into an ideology," and said that "a war in the name of God is never acceptable."

The wide-ranging message also condemned violations of religious freedoms, inequality of the sexes, "disrespectful" attitudes towards the environment, religion transformed into "ideology", terrorism, human rights abuses and the spread of nuclear weapons.

"The way to ensure a future of peace for everyone is found not only in international accords for the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, but also in the determined commitment to seek their reduction and definitive dismantling," the pope said.

[Modificato da benefan 12/12/2006 21.13]

As usual, everyone who has reported today about the Pope's message for World Peace Day 2007 has bitten off little pieces of it, nibbling at the edges, as it were.

It is far better to go straight to to the Pope's message and read it for yourself. I've posted it in HOMILIES, DISCOURSES AND MESSAGES - it's not all that lengthy!

It's another amazing document, closely reasoned and dense with messages that flow into each other, so it makes fluid reading. I do not say easy reading because the very subject matter touches on all the issues of life and society that one must frequently pause to reflect and assimilate.

Perhaps, even more remarkable is that it does not sound like a boilerplate Church document - it's hard to imagine anything issued under Benedict's name to be boilerplate - nor the usual platitudes one hears from diplomats, statesmen and United Nations functionaries.

Here's how one news agency reported on the message:

===============================================================

Set ethical limits
to wars on terrorism,
Pope says
By Philip Pullella


VATICAN CITY, Dec. 12, (Reuters) - Pope Benedict said on Tuesday states had to set ethical limits to what can be done to protect their people from terrorism and that some countries have flouted international humanitarian law in recent wars.

The Pope made his comments in an annual message for the Roman Catholic Church's World Day of Peace, celebrated on January 1.

In the message, which is traditionally sent to governments and international organizations, he also repeated his often stated belief that war in God's name is never justified.

In the 14-page document, the Pope also decried other threats to peace, such as hunger, poverty, environmental harm and regimes he said were persecuting Christians or imposing a single religion on their people.

"...the new shape of conflicts, especially since the terrorist threat unleashed completely new forms of violence, demands that the international community reaffirm international humanitarian law, and apply it to all present-day situations of armed conflict, including those not currently provided for by international law," he wrote.

He called for a review of what states could ethically do to protect their citizens while still trying to respect international humanitarian law, "which has not been consistently implemented in certain recent situations of war."

International human rights groups have criticized the U.S. government over its treatment of terror suspects at a base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and the practice of "rendition," or flying terrorist suspects to third countries for interrogation.

"...the scourge of terrorism demands a profound reflection on the ethical limits restricting the use of modern methods of guaranteeing internal security," he wrote.

The Pope, in the second peace message of his pontificate, appeared to acknowledge that fighting terrorism posed a difficult moral dilemma for governments.

"Increasingly, wars are not declared, especially when they are initiated by terrorist groups determined to attain their ends by any means available," he wrote.

"In the face of the disturbing events of recent years, states cannot fail to recognize the need to establish clearer rules to counter effectively the dramatic decline that we are witnessing," he said.

Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Vatican's Justice and Peace department who presented the message to the media, said fighting terrorism and respecting human rights had to go hand in hand.

"In discussing how mankind can defend itself from attacks from terrorists ... the Holy See believes that human rights must be respected, it does not favor torture, absolutely. The international community must find ways to face this problem," he told Reuters in an interview.

In the message, the Pope specifically mentioned the conflict in southern Lebanon, where he said "the duty to protect and help innocent victims and to avoid involving the civilian population was largely ignored."

The Pope did not name either Israel or Hezbollah guerrillas.

Benedict said the desire by some states to acquire nuclear weapons had thrown humanity back to the "profound anxieties of the Cold War period."

In a section on religious freedom, the Pope decried "regimes that impose a single religion on everyone." This was an apparent reference to Saudi Arabia, where non-Muslims are not allowed to practice their faith in public.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 12/12/2006 23.47]

Now, I cannot help myself. Why must MSM always have to have a 'line' about the people and events that they report on with some regularity?

The line about Benedict which journalists and commentators bandied about so facilely around the time they were evaluating his first year as Pope is that "People came to see John Paul II; they are coming to hear Benedict."

The new variation now is "People adored and loved John Paul II, they respect Benedict."

Quite apart from the obvious, invidious and wholly unnecessary comparison they cannot seem to avoid making with JPII, why should there be a dichotomy?

Isn't is more likely that people who wanted to 'see' JPII also came to hear him, and that people who come to 'hear' Benedict also want to see him? When you set out on an encounter with the Pope [or with any other signally important personality, for that matter], you aren't there for a partial selective experience; you are inevitably immersed in the total experience.

And the people who adored and loved JPII also necessarily respected him, just as the respect people feel for Benedict is part of their love and affection for him - and yes, adoration on the part of not a few Benaddicts and assorted men, women and children who feel not just the human warmth and goodness of this beautiful man, but the spiritual radiance that he casts so palpably - but which only the blase and deliberately blindered media do not seem to notice!

A Pope is unlike any other personage on earth. He is the Vicar of Christ on earth, and to Catholics, especially those who are brought up 'properly' as Catholics, that fact puts him on a plane apart from any other human being.

So the media should not dsecribe public reaction (the public in this case being mainly the Catholic faithful) to the Pope, any Pope, in terms they use to describe how people react to celebrities or political leaders.

One goes to see the Pope not because he is a showbiz performer or a revivalist, but because he is Christ's Vicar on earth.

However, MSM had so much invested in their conviction that no one could possibly fill up John Paul's shoes that they must continue to bend facts now in order not to prove their own selves completely wrong on that misguided assumption.

Again, the problem is they consider the papacy like some political office (just because it is filled by election). And they don't believe in the Holy Spirit. But even if they don't, a good secular way of looking at it is that the Church gets what it needs with any Pope who is elected - even the sinful Popes had their uses in their time, if only to precipitate a crisis that results in changes for the better.

I will always have a special respect for John Allen who had the courage to buck his colleagues' herd mentality to declare unequivocally: The cardinals knew that for the sake of the Church at this time in history, only another giant could step in to take the place of John Paul II - and Joseph Ratzinger was the only one who qualified.

The cardinals who elected him know the man and they know the Church, so it is safe to say they knew what they were doing. It is not given to anybody in media to have this kind of knowledge to act upon. But they will not draw the obvious conclusion.

It is very rare in the history of human institutions for the most important position to be occupied in succession by two greatmen. It is a tribute to the Catholic Church that it has that great good fortune.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 13/12/2006 3.30]

Pope urges palliative care for terminal illness

Vatican, Dec. 13, 2006 (CWNews.com) - In his annual message for the World Day of the Sick, Pope Benedict XVI underlines the “need to promote policies which create conditions where human beings can bear even incurable illnesses and death in a dignified manner.”

The World Day of the Sick will be observed on February 11, 2007-- the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes-- with the international focus of the event in Seoul, Korea. The papal message for the occasion was released by the Vatican on December 13. The full text of the message is available on the Vatican web site.

Despite medical advances, the Pope notes, many diseases remain incurable, while many poor people lack access to proper sanitary conditions and medical treatment. The Pope observes that Christians have “always shown particular concern for the infirm,” and special efforts by Catholic health-care workers continue throughout the world.

Putting a special stress on the need for palliative care, the Holy Father calls for “integral care” that provides spiritual comfort as well as physical relief. He encourages those who are suffering terminal illness to “contemplate the sufferings of Christ crucified,” and unite themselves to Him, turning their pain to the spiritual welfare of the world. The Church, he promises, “wishes to assist you and stand at your side.”

Pope Benedict’s emphasis on palliative care has a special urgency in Italy, as headlines relate the story of a man, Piergiorgio Welby, who has brought a plea before a Roman asking for assistance in ending his own life. The weekly periodical of the Paulist Fathers, Christian Family, has stated that “the request to suspend all care, including ordinary care, is objectively a question of euthanasia.”

Head of Greek Church heading to Rome and Pope Benedict

The Associated Press
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
ATHENS, Greece

Archbishop Christodoulos, head of the Orthodox Church of Greece, was to fly to Rome late Wednesday for a four-day visit that will include a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.

The archbishop's visit, which was announced last month, will be his first to the Church of Rome apart from his attendance at the April 2005 funeral of Pope John Paul II.

In remarks Wednesday before his departure, Christodoulos referred to "the scandal of the division of Christians" and spoke of a continuing, 25-year "dialogue that has as its aim to break the ice between the Churches and collaboration on other levels not related to our doctrines."

Relations between Orthodox and Catholic Churches have improved significantly in recent years, though they remain divided by longstanding questions of dogma.

Christodoulos also set his visit in a broader inter-faith perspective, expressing "the need for collaboration of religions, and not only between the Christian churches" and saying that world peace "is threatened by the fanaticism of certain persons, on which they put the label of religion."

The two ecclesiastical leaders will meet on Thursday. At a ceremony, Pope Benedict is scheduled to give the archbishop part of the chain said to have once restrained the imprisoned St. Paul.

Archbishop Christodoulos' visit reciprocates Pope John Paul's trip to Athens in 2001, during which the pope visited the Areopagus hill where St. Paul is said to have preached.

Christodoulos is also to receive an honorary doctorate at the Pontifical Lateran University in Rome.

His visit also comes in the footsteps of Pope Benedict's visit to Turkey two weeks ago, which helped alleviate tensions between the Christian and Islamic worlds that had been exacerbated by papal comments earlier in the year

Pope, Israeli official discuss
problems of Christians in Holy Land
By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service



VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Meeting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Pope Benedict XVI raised questions regarding the situation of the dwindling Catholic population in the Holy Land, including in Bethlehem, the Vatican said.

The Vatican said the pope voiced his concerns particularly in light of the approaching celebration of Christmas.

The pope and prime minister met for 26 minutes Dec. 13 in a small meeting room in the back of the Vatican's audience hall.

Bethlehem Mayor Victor Batarseh told a press conference Dec. 11 that a serious drop in Christian tourism to his town, emigration and Israel's erection of a security fence cutting many Bethlehem residents off from jobs in nearby Jerusalem were having a disastrous impact on Bethlehem and its residents.

Oded Ben-Hur, the Israeli ambassador to the Vatican, told Catholic News Service that the pope spoke about "the difficult situation of the Christian community in Bethlehem."

"The prime minister promised to do everything possible to alleviate" the community's suffering and to ease Christians' access to Bethlehem over the Christmas holidays, the ambassador said.

The Vatican's Dec. 13 statement also said the pope and prime minister spoke about peace in the Middle East.

Ben-Hur said Pope Benedict thanked the prime minister for Israeli's declaration of a cease-fire with Palestinian militias, although Ben-Hur said the prime minister said it is getting more and more difficult "to withhold reactions" to missiles being launched into Israel from Gaza.

Ben-Hur said that when Olmert renewed a government invitation for the pope to visit Israel, the pope said he really wanted to make such a trip, but was looking for "a moment of calm."

"The prime minister told him, 'You can bring the calm,'" the ambassador said.

Pope Benedict and Olmert met as Vatican and Israeli government representatives were scheduled to meet in Jerusalem to continue on-again, off-again negotiations regarding the legal and tax status of the Catholic Church and its institutions in Israel.

Ben-Hur said Olmert told the pope he had instructed the Israeli negotiators "to make every effort to finalize the agreements."

The meeting also came one day after the Vatican issued a strong statement in opposition to the Iranian government's Dec. 11-12 conference questioning whether the Holocaust took place.

Telling the pope he was "the world's most revered moral voice," Olmert asked the pope to denounce anti-Semitism in general and the Iran conference specifically, Ben-Hur said.

Pope Benedict told the prime minister the Vatican had issued a statement Dec. 12, but said he was willing to add to the statement or clarify it if the prime minister felt it would make the Vatican's position even more clear, the ambassador said.

Ben-Hur also said the pope and prime minister spoke about Pope Benedict's Nov. 28-Dec. 1 trip to Turkey and that Olmert asked the pope to continue "to encourage moderate Islam."

Before going to meet Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, Olmert met at the Vatican with Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Vatican secretary of state.

Adding the wire service stories on the Olmert visit:

Olmert asks Pope to call
on Christians to protest
Holocaust denial


The Holy Father with Olmert's delegation

ROME, Dec. 13 (AFP) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has asked Pope Benedict XVI to "personally and publicly" intervene to ask Christians to protest against Holocaust denial after an Iranian conference on the issue.

Iran has defended its decision to hold the conference which ended on Tuesday and was styled as a scientific forum to examine questions posed by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has repeatedly cast doubt on the truth of the Holocaust.

Olmert's spokesman said that he had asked the pope during a 35-minute meeting to call on Christians to protest against the so-called Holocaust revisionist movement.

Later, after a joint news conference with Italian Prime Minsiter Romano Prodi, Olmert told journalists that "the position of the pope was without ambiguity" on Holocaust denial.

"We raised the question that there would be a personal declaration and not a statement" to condemn it, he added Wednesday.

The Vatican on Tuesday issued a statement that stressed the "appalling tragedy" of the mass murder of millions of Jews by the wartime German Nazi regime and warned of the dangers of denying historical evidence.

Olmert also met with other Vatican officials for discussions on the Middle East peace process and questions concerning Catholics in Israel, particularly in relation to upcoming Christmas celebrations, a Vatican statement said.

Olmert, meeting the pontiff for the first time, also repeated an invitation for Benedict XVI to visit Israel.

"He agreed with me in principle," even if no date has yet been fixed, Olmert said, adding that he was surprised by the pope's "very good knowledge of the region".

The Israeli prime minister promised to accelerate negotiations between the Vatican and Israel over the fiscal status of the Catholic Church in Israel and the protection of Christian holy sites and other church property there.

Olmert's visit to the Vatican took place as a bilateral commission between the Vatican and Israel restarted work in Jerusalem to finalise the economic part of an agreement between the two states concluded in 1993, Vatican sources said.


Olmert asks Pope to denounce
Iran Holocaust forum
By Allyn Fisher-Ilan



VATICAN CITY, Dec. 13 (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert asked Pope Benedict to denounce a conference in Iran questioning the Holocaust, an Olmert aide said on Wednesday.

The Israeli leader and the head of the world's 1 billion Roman Catholics spoke for about 40 minutes at the Vatican. Olmert, on a tour of Germany and Italy, renewed a standing invitation for the Pontiff to visit the Holy Land.

"The prime minister asked the Pope to talk about the Holocaust denial conference and not just to stop with a statement," said Olmert's spokeswoman Miri Eisin.

She was referring to a toughly worded statement by the Vatican on Tuesday criticizing a conference hosted by Iran to question whether Nazi Germany used gas chambers.

Iran has been accused of encouraging the denial of the killing of 6 million Jews during World War Two.

The Vatican statement said the Holocaust must remain forever a warning to respect the rights of others. Using the Hebrew word for the Holocaust, "Shoah," it expressed "great compassion."

Later, after talks with Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, Olmert told reporters that the Tehran conference was "another expression of the most brutal kind of anti-Semitism."

Prodi said he had told Olmert of his own "disgust and total disagreement" at the Holocaust forum.

Olmert said the Pope expressed "willingness" to visit the Holy Land, adding: "The timing will be determined at a later date." Benedict has already told Israeli leaders he would like to visit the Holy Land next year.

The first pope to go there was the late John Paul in 2000, after leading the Vatican to forge diplomatic relations with the Jewish state.

Olmert and the Pope also discussed outstanding details of a bilateral agreement between the Vatican and Israel regarding property ownership and taxation of the church.

The Israeli aide said Benedict also complemented Olmert on "the restraint he has shown" to keep a ceasefire going in Gaza.

A Vatican statement said the Pope, Olmert and Vatican diplomats discussed Middle East prospects, the situation of the Catholic minority there and access to Christian sites in the Holy Land over the coming Christmas season.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/12/2006 14.29]

George Weigel's book, GOD'S CHOICE, has just been published in Italian, and Avennire interviewed him about it, and about the Pope's recent trip to Turkey. Here is a translation:

Religious freedom and
the challenge of Islam
By Paola Springhetti



His book is simply titled BENEDICT XVI but it carries a demanding subtitle: 'God's choice".

Because, George Weigel says, Joseph Ratzinger is truly the right man at the right time, for his ability to go to the heart of a problem that concerns the West as much as the East: the relationship between faith and reason, with all that comes from it insofar as distinguishing bad from good.

[The book has just been published by Rubbettino, 366 pp., 18 Euros].

In this context, he thinks the Pope's trip to Turkey is fundamental for understanding not just the character, but also the concerns, of this Pontificate.

In your opinion, what objectives did this trip achieve?
Initially, this trip had an ecumenical and pastoral character: it wasn't going to be a Pope visiting a Muslim nation, but Peter going to meet Andrew.

It was also a challenge to the whole world to define a cultural configuration that acknowledges respect for everyone's religion as among the fundamental human rights, because Turkey imposes pressures and restrictions on the Patriarch of Constantinople..

In fact, the trip achieved two objectives: the first being to reinforce the ties between Rome and Constantinople, the Pope having defended the right to religious freedom of Patriarch Bastholomew as well as the Christian population of Turkey. The second was to focus on the key question that Europe now faces: whether Turkey belongs within the orbit of European civilization or not.

In this respect, Pope Benedict appeared to be more favorable to Turkey's entry into the European Union than European institutions themselves, which are very cool to the idea at the moment .
There are certain standards to evaluate Turkey's belonging to the European orbit. The first is that of human rights: among other things, if this land should develop a real respect for human rights, we will have a demonstration that Islamic culture can give rise to a state which truly respects religion.

Father Lombardi, when he referred to the Pope's thinking on this issue, expressed the readiness of the Pope to welcome the progress Turkey makes along this road, but the concern remains, which could be expressed this way: If Turkey, with its history, gains admission into thr EU now [without resolving the human rights issue], then it will show that the EU is merely an alliance for organizing the economy of the continent.

Which was certainly not the intention of its founding fathers: Schumann, Adenauer, De Gasperi conceived of European institutions as an expression of Christian roots common to the nations of Europe This could evolve into the expression of a common humanistic culture with profoundly Christian roots,even if not exclusively. But without significant changes taking place there first, a decision to admit Turkey now would make it nothing more than a business proposition [i.e., a market expansion].

Why did you entitle your book 'God's Choice'?
Ratzinger did not want to become Pope. When some friends aired the idea to him, they met with resistance. But once he accepted 'God's choice' at the Conclave in the spirit of obedience, he has become Pope as only he can. And that is as a great teacher, a great catechist, a man who constantly invokes the holiness of the Eucharist, and one who is constantly invoking the relationship between reason and faith. And it is good that he does this.

You have also written about John Paul II. Surely you have been tempted to make comparisons .
I often think of Papa Wojtyla, on whose biography I continue to work. But in the first 15 years of his Pontificate, many considered him a controversial figure: it was only in the second half of the 1990s that he came to be universally recognized as a father figure.

I would also like to add that the Church is not only the Pope - it is made up of the bishops, the priests and all the people of God on whom the duty rests to bring His message to the world. We should be responsible for some things. We cannot expect the Pope to resolve all the problems of the world.

In what sense is Benedict a great catechist and a great teacher?
The pastoral dimension is the key to his Magisterium. When he talks - whether it is at the Wednesday audiences, at thw Angelus, with first-communicant children, or an interview for German TV - he speaks with luminous clarity. Whoever is willing to listen can understand what he says, and consequently can decide what to do.


The Holy Father at yesterday's general audience.

Then, there is his global role. This Pope has the ability to put a universal question on the world agenda as no one else can. That is what happened in Regensburg where he said, in effect, that lack of reason in the practice of faith could lead to evil, just as much as lack of faith in the uses of reason.

Which is a criticism of the West...
The way in which we think of our faith - or don't - strongly conditions what we judge to be right or wrong. This is evident in radical Islam, but also in Europe where there is only reason without faith. This criticism of contemporary Western culture was already present in John Paul II, ss we can read in Ecclesia in Europa and in Fides et ratio.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/12/2006 14.08]