AD MULTOS ANNOS, BENEDICTE!





VATICAN CITY , April 16 (APcom) - "The Pope is very well, we had lunch with quite a number of cardinals, he is in optimum form...and is very happy with all the greetings he has been getting from all over the world for his 80th birthday," Cardinal Tarciso Bertone said on SAT 2000'S program 'Mosaico" tonight.

He said that, over lunch, "we talked about problems which concerN not only Italy and Europe, but the whole world. The Pope has a global perspective. But tonight, he is all set to listen to the music at the concert which will start shortly."

Bertone also said that even if it is the first day that the Pope's book on Jesus is actually on sale, the Pope has already been getting numerous requests for the second volume.

According to Bertone, the Pope says, 'Adagio, adagio - not so fast! First read this book well, then we'll see."

Bertone said that "the Pope's book is an exceptional testimonial by a man of faith who is passionate about Christ
and WHO has cast light into the lives of many wHo are searching for the sense of life."

Is the Pope the Panzerkardinal as the media presented him? "The Pope is a gentle man, he is also frank and direct, but he has an extraordinary capacity to listen and an ability to assimilate the opinions of his interlocutor. He's a man who makes you feel he's is your friend," said the Pope's closest collaborator.

And what is the Pope's greatest desire? "That his messages, which are typically evangelical, be understood, not distorted, but understood and conveyed in the sense he wants it to be communicated to the world."

AD MULTOS ANNOS, BENEDICTE!





Tributes pour in for pope
on his 80th birthday
by Gina Doggett



VATICAN CITY, April 16 (AFP) - Well-wishers paid tribute to Pope Benedict XVI on his 80th birthday Monday as he lunched with cardinals and took in a classical music concert.

Italian actress Sofia Loren, 72, lent her star quality to the event, flying in from Geneva to attend the concert of selections by Mozart, Dvorak and Italian composer Andrea Gabrieli in honour of the music-loving pontiff.

Speaking after the concert by the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, Benedict, himself an accomplished pianist, paid tribute to the uniting force of music.

"Music - and here I am thinking in particular of the great Mozart and naturally many other composers - is truly the universal language of beauty, capable of uniting people of good will together in all the world."

Music moves people "to open themselves to the absolute Great and Beautiful, which have their ultimate source in God himself," he said.



The German pope marked the day with little fanfare, and it was quiet in Vatican City as the more than 1,000 employees of the Holy See were given the day off - as well as a special bonus of 500 euros (675 dollars).

The spiritual leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics had marked his birthday, as well as the second anniversary of his election as pope, which falls on Thursday, with an open-air mass on Sunday attended by some 50,000 pilgrims.

Tributes poured in from around the world through the day Monday, including a greeting from Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexis II, who praised Benedict as "a sincerely and deeply devout Christian who speaks from the heart."

Benedict has yet to travel to Russia despite warming relations between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Holy See.

Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed the pope's "altruistic efforts (that) serve the noble cause of strengthening spiritual and moral values, the foundations of the family and Christian values in the life of modern society."

Putin's Italian counterpart Giorgio Napolitano sent birthday greetings on behalf of the Italian nation, "whose deep and ancient ties with the Holy See are nourished by the shared values of peace and the promotion of human dignity."

Also on Monday, the pope's new book, "Jesus of Nazareth", went on sale in Italy, his native Germany and in Poland, homeland of his predecessor John Paul II.

Billed as his answer to popular publications such as Dan Brown's best-selling The Da Vinci Code, the book attempts to reconcile the historical figure of Jesus with that of the Gospels.

Brisk sales were reported in Italy, where the initial press run totalled 350,000.

The pope's private secretary, Georg Gaenswein, said his boss had received many birthday cards as well as "little gifts" such as music CDs, flowers and a giant stuffed toy bear - which he donated to a children's hospital.

Benedict's brother Georg Ratzinger, himself a priest, offered him a cope, or ceremonial mantle, and liturgical ornaments, according to ANSA.

On Wednesday after the pope's weekly audience, he will be given an enormous birthday card measuring 136 metres (150 yards) by a delegation from Bonn, where he taught theology and philosophy from 1959 to 1963, ANSA said.

[The rest of the story is a repeat of the latter part of her April 15 wrap-up, with all its inaccuracies.]

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

On Lella's blog, I read that the Vatican website overloaded today because of traffic on the greeting site.


And I don't think any of us will appreciate the morbid tone and implications of this AP wrap-up! I think it is very tasteless to engage in such speculation especially on the person's birthday!


Pope marks 80th birthday with concert
By NICOLE WINFIELD



VATICAN CITY, April 16 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI marked his 80th birthday Monday by lunching with cardinals and listening to music by one of his favorite composers — Mozart — in a relatively low-key celebration in keeping with the quiet pace of what he has said would be a "short" papacy. [Did Benedict ever say that?]

Benedict spent the morning meeting with well-wishers from his native Germany, including the governors of Bavaria and Schleswig-Holstein, and a representative of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox Christians.

Gifts poured in, including 80 bottles of Bavarian beer from the archdiocese of Munich, a birthday cake from some seminarians in Rome, and a giant stuffed teddy bear, which the pontiff donated to a local children's hospital.

Benedict, a trained pianist, attended a Mozart concert in his honor Monday evening in a Vatican auditorium.

"In looking back on my life, I thank God for having placed music next to me, almost like a traveling companion," Benedict said at the end of the concert.

On Sunday, Benedict celebrated Mass on the steps of St. Peter's Basilica. The Vatican post office issued a special postcard and postmark.

The Vatican generally does not give out information about the pope's health, citing his privacy. Except for an occasional cough, though, the pope appears healthy and robust and in two years has never skipped a planned event for health reasons.

Nevertheless, the passing of the milestone — he is now five years older than the normal mandatory retirement age for bishops — raised questions about the future of the papacy.

Benedict himself has said that being pope is "really tiring" and, in an interview with German television last August, said he does not feel strong enough to take many long trips.

When Pope John Paul II was in his later years and clearly suffering from Parkinson's disease, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger once suggested that there might come a time when popes have to retire.

In a February 2004 interview with the Italian religious affairs weekly Famiglia Cristiana, Ratzinger said he would not rule out term limits for popes because they are living longer now than ever before.

"The pope is selected for life because he is a father and his paternity goes before his function," Ratzinger was quoted then as saying. "Perhaps in the future, with life being prolonged, one also would consider new norms."

A year later, after his election as pope, Benedict himself predicted to the cardinals who elected him that his would be a "short reign." And at the time of his election, his brother Georg expressed concern about the toll the job would take on him.

Benedict has kept the pace slow, limiting his foreign and domestic travel and cutting back on ceremonial and bureaucratic appearances.

Benedict does have some taxing travel coming up, including a May 9-14 trip to Brazil. It will be his first visit to the Americas.

And he has some expected documents in the works, including a letter to Catholics in China and a document expected to liberalize the use of the old Latin Mass, as well as the second volume of a book on the life of Jesus Christ. Volume one came out on Monday.

In the pope's Bavarian birthplace, Marktl am Inn, some 300 people gathered for prayers in front of the house where he was born at 4:15 a.m., marking the exact time of his birth.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/04/2007 1.01]

We knew about this Saturday when it happened, from the Pope's KNOWN schedule of activities, but since it is only being reported today as a separate item, I'm posting it for the record. Especially since I thinkit's the first time a Pope has ever discussed an upcoming trip at a full Curial meeting!

Pope meets with heads of curial departments
to discuss trip to Brazil

By Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY, April 16 (CNS) - Pope Benedict XVI met with the heads of departments of the Roman Curia to discuss his upcoming trip to Latin America.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, told reporters that the encounter April 14 focused exclusively on the pope's May 9-13 visit to Brazil. No other details of the meeting were made public by the Vatican.

The main purpose of the visit, his first papal trip to the Western Hemisphere, is to inaugurate the fifth general assembly of Latin American and Caribbean bishops at the Marian sanctuary of Aparecida May 13. The pope also will preside over events in Sao Paulo and visit a "farm of hope" for former drug addicts during his stay.

The pope has previously called meetings of the heads of Vatican congregations and pontifical councils to discuss diverse topics, including priestly celibacy, efforts to reconcile with traditionalist groups and rules regulating use of the Tridentine rite of the Mass.

Vatican sources said that in the coming weeks the pope was expected to issue a document allowing for the expanded use of the rite.

CNA, however, has a different take on the story:

Pope Holds Surprise Meeting
with Roman Curia:
Sign of Coming Documents?

Vatican City, Apr 16, 2007 (CNA).- In what could be a sign of an important upcoming announcement, Pope Benedict XVI convened a surprise meeting on Saturday with the leaders of the Roman curia.

The Holy See’s Press Office simply reported that the meeting took place on Saturday morning at the Apostolic Palace, where the Pontiff resides.

Although the Holy See has not revealed the nature of the meeting, several Vatican analysts said the Holy Father has prepared two important documents that merit the opinion of curial officials.

The first is a the possible Motu Propio—which could be accompanied by a study on the subject by experts—that would allow the universal celebration of the Mass of St. Pius V, the Latin Rite that was universally celebrated prior to the liturgical reform of Vatican II.

The second document is the expected letter to Chinese Catholics, which Benedict XVI himself announced would be forthcoming during the Easter season and which could mark an historic turn in relations between the Holy See and Communist China.


Another April 14 story only being reported now by CNS is this. The new item we have not reported before is the latter part, about Iran's Khatamee coming to see the Pope.

Bush expected to meet formally
with pope in early June, says Vatican
By Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY, April 16 (CNS) -- U.S. President George W. Bush is expected to have his first formal audience with Pope Benedict XVI in early June, the Vatican spokesman said.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi said April 14 that Bush is expected to visit the Vatican June 9 or 10 after participating in the summit of leaders of the Group of Eight industrialized countries in Germany.

Bush made his last visit to the Vatican for the April 8, 2005, funeral of Pope John Paul II. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict, celebrated the funeral Mass.

The president had met Pope John Paul three times.

The president's brother, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, led the U.S. delegation to Pope Benedict's inaugural Mass.

Also April 14, Father Lombardi told reporters that former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami would visit Pope Benedict at the Vatican May 4.

Khatami was scheduled to be in Rome for a conference on dialogue and peace sponsored by the Pontifical Gregorian University and the Iranian Embassy to the Vatican.


Vatican says nearly 3.4 million
attended events in pope's second year

VATICAN CITY, April 16 (CNS) - In the second year of Pope Benedict XVI's pontificate, almost 3.4 million people participated in his weekly general audiences, group audiences, liturgies and the recitation of the Angelus on Sundays and holy days.

The Prefecture of the Pontifical Household, headed by U.S. Archbishop James M. Harvey, published the data April 14 in anticipation of the April 19 anniversary of the pope's election.

It said that from late April 2006 through early April 2007, more than 1 million people attended the pope's Wednesday general audiences, while more than 350,000 people joined special groups granted a papal audience.

More than half a million people participated in papal liturgies at the Vatican and in Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome, the prefecture said.

And 1.46 million people joined the pope for the Sunday recitation of the Angelus in St. Peter's Square or in the courtyard of the papal summer villa at Castel Gandolfo.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/04/2007 5.29]

In new book, pope quoted as seeing
no conflict between faith, science
By Michael Lawton
Catholic News Service

COLOGNE, Germany, April 16 (CNS) - Pope Benedict XVI has said that he sees no conflict between faith and science in the exploration of the universe's development, but he has criticized those who see evolution as an explanation for everything.

The remarks, made in a discussion he hosted at Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome, with some of his former students in September last year, have been published in a German book titled "Schoepfung und Evolution" ("Creation and Evolution"). The book was published April 11 by the Sankt Ulrich Verlag publishing house.

The students have met annually since 1978 with their former doctoral supervisor, but this is the first time they have published the lectures and discussions.

During the discussion, the pope said it was not a matter of "deciding either in favor of a creationism, which out of principle excludes science from its considerations, or in favor of a theory of evolution, which underplays its own gaps and refuses to see questions which go beyond the methodological possibilities of natural science."

What was important, he said, was "the interplay of different dimensions of reason, an interplay which opens up into the road to faith."

The pope argued that Christianity was a religion of reason, but a reason that was wider than the limited scope of modern science.

For the pope, science reaches its limits when its assumptions can no longer be tested.

"We can't bring 10,000 generations into the laboratory," he said. That leaves "gaps in the possibility of proving or disproving (the theory) by experiment."

However, Pope Benedict said, God cannot be used simply to explain away the problems.

"It's not as if I wanted to stuff dear God into these gaps," he said. "He's too big to fit into such gaps."

Pope Benedict also took a firm stand against science books' tendency to suggest that things came about by nature and evolution.

"The question has to be asked: What is nature or evolution as (an active) subject? It doesn't exist! If one says that nature does this or that, this can only be an attempt to summarize a series of events under one actor which, as such, doesn't exist," the pope said.

Nature and evolution are made up of many individual steps, and the pope insisted that one must look beyond nature and evolution for a guiding principle.

Pope Benedict said science had discovered large areas of rationality and had given people new understanding.

But, he said, "in its joy at the greatness of its discoveries, it has tended to take away from us dimensions of reason which we still need."

Questions raised have to be answered by reason and "can't just be left to religious feelings," said the pope.

Evolution, even if it includes irrational, chaotic and destructive processes, seems to have its own rationality, said the pope. It has adopted the few positive mutations which occurred and exploited the limited possibilities which evolution has offered.

"Where does this rationality come from? Is there a causative rationality?" the pope asked.

"Naturally there is rationality in nature, but that doesn't allow us to have complete insight into God's plan," said Pope Benedict.

He pointed to the "riddle of cruelty in nature" which remains unexplained, even by philosophy. That requires a further step, the step of faith in the Logos, the creative rationality of God himself "which unbelievably was able to become flesh, die and rise again," he said.


From DIE WELT today:



POPE BOOK OUTSELLS LATEST
(AND LAST) HARRY POTTER BOOK
ON AMAZON.DE

Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI's JESUS OF NAZARETH went on sale in Germany today. But amazon.de says it quickly went past the seventh and last Harry Potter volume "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" (released in English) on its best-selling list.

Tahir Hussain, director of Amazon's book department said:
"the Harry Potter books are the best-selling titles of all time at amazon.de - so for the Pope's book to top it right away is an absolute phenomenon."

However, Ratzinger also outsold Potter once before - right after the Conclave, the German edition of 'Salt of the Earth' outsold 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.'

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/04/2007 8.14]

DIE WELT this weekend had at least six articles about the Pope and his birthday.

Cardinal Meisner speaks of
Pope's resemblance to Jesus

Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne told a television talk show taped in Hamburg Sunday for broadcast on the Pope's birthday, that he sees a resemblance of Pope Benedict XVI to Jesus Christ.

"I wrote him in my personal greeting for his birthday: 'Holy Father, if Jesus had lived to be 80, then He would have looked like you. Because you have lived 80 years in Communion with the Lord.'"

Meisner said to the show's moderator Reinhodl Beckmann that such a communion lasting decades shows itself in the face. "One says of couples who know each other well and have been faithful to each other a long time that they come to look alike, like brother and sister."

He said that he has always felt in his meetings with Benedict that he was in the presence of someone "who is really in touch with God, with Christ" and says that whenever he sees him, "I always leave better than I was when I came."



Meisner celebrated a Mass to celebrate the Pope's birthday in Berlin's St. Hedwig Cathedral yesterday attended by Chancellor Angela Merkel and the diplomatic corps.

In his homily, Meisner once again called the Pope 'the Mozart of theology", a term he first used shortly after the Concalve in 2005.

"His theology,' he said, "is not only true and good, but also beautiful. His words sound like music to the ears and hearts of his listeners." That is why, he said, the Pope attracts crowds to his audiences.

The Berlin Mass was the world premiere of a Mass "Tu es Petrus" composed by Wolfgang Seifen, a work commissioned by the Diocese of Cologne as an 80th birthday gift to the Pope.


Bischop Schraml opens
Pope Benedict Center in Marktl



In Marktl am Inn yesterday, Sunday, Bishop Wilhjelm Shraml of Passau officially opened the Pope's 'birth house' as a community center, which will document and exhibit the life and work of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI.

He placed a cross in the room where the Pope was born and blessed the three-century-old house (built in 1701).

Before that, Schraml said Mass at St. Oswald, the church where Ratzinger was baptized. In his homily, he called Benedict XVI 'a brilliant master and teacher of theology,' one who invites interaction from his listeners in his own unique and unmistakable manner. He prayed for the Pope's good health and God's blessing on his work and for 'the motherly protection of the Virgin Mother'.

The Pope Benedict community center is managed and operated by a foundation formed by the dioceses of Passau and Munich-Freising.


Superstar cult continues
around the Pope

Wolfgang Beinert, parish priest of Pentling,has a theory.

"The Pope at 80 is in excellent form because he feels that he is loved."

Beinert, who was once a student and then a university assistant to Joseph Ratzinger, says Benedict draws real joy from the office he performs and the goodwill and affection that the faithful give him.

Beinert is right that the people love the Pope. More than that, they celebrate him. And yet, when he was elected two years ago, no one expected anything like this.

Cardinal Ratzinger had the reputation of a backward-looking Catholic and his name was a symbol for conservatism. How will he deal with people, many asked. And what about the media?

But as if he had become another man altogether overnight, Benedict became almost from the very beginning, a cult figure. A million youth celebrated him in Cologne in Augustt 2005. A teenage magazine distributed a poster that said BENEDICT SUPERSTAR.

A year later, Germany celebrated his homecoming to Bavaria. More TV cameras were set up in Bavaria than for the World Cup championships a few months earlier. Never were a Pope's words so omnipresent in Germany. His books, and books about him, fill the best-seller lists.

In the past year, Benedict attracted almostt 4 million people to St. Peter's Square, easily double the figure drawn by his predecessor at the height of his popularity.

Perhaps even more important, since Benedict became Pope, the number of Catholics leaving the Church inGermany has dropped, while the humber of converts and returnees is rising.

Marktl, the little town where he was born, is all abuzz. Bakeries still turn out marzizpan miters and Benediktschnitten (cake). Visitors from Italy and Poland come away with bonbonnierres with the Pope's face on it, as it is on glasses and on souvenir spoons. Devotional stores do booming business.

The town square, where the Holy Father stepped down last September to greet the people, has a four-meter bronze Benedict-pillar showing scenes of his life, and his saying, "he who believes is never alone, in life or in death."

Marktl now has eight bus parking lots, 15 new work-generating business enterprises and a four-language Internet center.

But the whole of Bavaria has seen a rise in tourism - 100,000 more visitors last year than in 2005. The Marian shrine at Altoetting has seen 20 million pilgrims this year, about 10% more than at any time in the past 10 years.

"Some visitors stand before the baptismal font where the Pope was baptized and weep," says one tour operator.

The 'birth house' will now be a community cente, where people can meet, pray and engage in social activities.

Monday morning, to mark the Pope's birthday, parish priest Josef Kaiser was scheduled to say a prayer in the room where the Pope was born at the exact time he was born, 4:18 A.M. and then lead a candelight procession to St. Oswald where he was baptized.

Later in the day, children from Marktl and surrounding towns were to release 800 white and yellow balloons, and in the afternoon, Market Square was to be formally renamed Papst-Benedikt XVI Platz.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/04/2007 9.38]

Well, it's that time of year that may well be the season of apoplexy. Over the next several days, we will have this kind of article coming at us thick and fast, as MSM continues to peddle its fallacies.

What infuriates me is that journalists like Victor Simpson, who have been covering the Vatican for at least a decade, persist in feigning that a Pope, any Pope, can lightly overturn 2000 years of Tradition and a deposit of faith that he, the Vicar of Christ on earth, is sworn to protect and safeguard.

If you cover the Vatican, you have to cover it in the context of what the Church is and what faith is. The church is not a political party and the Pope is not a politician. You can't equate him to John Kerry or Nancy Pelosi who pick and choose what they want to practice of the faith.

In effect, that is what the journalists covering the Church and Chruch affairs have been doing since Vatican II - equating its stated 'opening to modernity' with the abject surrender of everything that the Church has guarded for two millennia. For what? To curry favor with the vociferous minority?

How utterly silly to repeat those meaningless mantras of liberalism as the laundry list of expectations for the head of the Catholic church to fulfill! And how arrogant to think that their wishes should constitute a command to the Pope!

Benedict is not 'turning right' by sticking to the Church positions on these buzz issues for liberals. He has always been right, correct, proper, conscientious, where the Magisterium is concerned. He will listen but he will reason back, because the Church does have its reasons, which it can defend chapter-and-verse, literally.

Faith is necessarily a discipline. If everyone were free to do as they pleased, then what is there to have faith in? Some arrive at faith simply, by intuition, or by a gift of grace. Some must reason their way to it and through it. Either way, once you accept it, you accept it wholly.

Journalists who report on the Church and deliberately refuse to consider it on its terms are intellectually dishonest. And that's a slippery slope that leads to all kinds of journalistic sins of commission and omission, to outright prostitution of what journalism is about - objective reporting, fair play, the truth.


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


After 2 years, pope turns right
By VICTOR L. SIMPSON



VATICAN CITY, April 17 (AP) - As he approaches the third year of his reign, Pope Benedict XVI is hardening into the kind of pontiff that liberals feared and conservatives hoped for.

Elected April 19, 2005, to succeed his dear friend John Paul II, the leader of the world's Roman Catholics slid smoothly into his job as pastor of an enormous flock. He reached out to dissidents, other faiths and countries long hostile to the church.

But recently, as his 80th birthday approached, the ormer Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger has drawn a tougher line.

He has rebuffed calls, including by bishops in his native Germany, to let divorced Catholics who remarry participate fully in the church.

He has warned Catholic politicians who must decide on such issues as abortion, euthanasia and marriage that the faith's values are "not negotiable." And he has closed the door on any relaxation of the celibacy requirement for priests.

Benedict's persistent defense of the "traditional family" based on marriage between a man and a woman has emboldened Italy's bishops, who are waging a fierce battle against the government's proposal to extend some rights to unmarried couples, including same-sex unions.

And there was last September's trip to Germany, when the pope's references to Islam and holy war infuriated the Muslim world. Benedict has since stepped back a bit, while continuing to condemn violence in the name of religion and demanding freedom of religion, he has refrained from pointing a finger at Islam.

Indeed, Marco Politi, the Vatican correspondent for the Italian daily La Repubblica and a biographer of John Paul II, sees Benedict's tenure as mainly focused internally. The pope has been primarily interested in teaching Catholicism to Catholics.

"Ratzinger is a great cultural, spiritual and intellectual figure, but at the Vatican he's been a preacher. In history, a great professor is not always a great head of state," Politi said. "There have been no internal reforms — such as to give the faithful enough clergy — or new initiatives on the international scene for dialogue among the great religions. There is a great deal of catechism and little politics."

One of the pope's prime targets for a rekindling of the faith is Europe, which he recently described as "going down a road which could lead it to take its leave from history."

But Benedict has struggled to roll back the tide of secularism. He lost in predominantly Catholic Spain, which approved gay marriage, and now he has now turned his sights on his own backyard.

The debate has been particularly shrill in Italy, where the pope's words — he is also bishop of Rome — have immediate impact in the media. After Italians voted down a Vatican-backed attempt to overturn Italy's liberal abortion in 1981, John Paul II basically kept out of Italian politics.

Benedict seems willing to revisit social issues.

His choice as new head of the Italian bishops conference has taken a particularly hard line, and Italian police have given him special protection because of threats on his life.

The pope's stance is starting to have ripples elsewhere. The American bishops recently criticized pamphlets by a Marquette University theologian as incompatible with church teaching while a lesbian couple in Wyoming were told they couldn't receive Communion.

Appointments in key dioceses in the United States and elsewhere, where bishops are reaching retirement age, will be a test of the church Benedict is shaping.

Enrique Miret Magdalena, a respected moderate Spanish theologian who is himself 93, said Benedict, who turned 80 on Monday, is "an old man, and the papacy weighs heavily upon him. He's afraid of change."

As Benedict approached the anniversary date of his succession, the Vatican took the unusual step of setting down the fundamental principles of Benedict's papacy.

A speech given by its No. 2 official and longtime Benedict aide, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, to an audience of industrialists in Milan listed the fight against relativism and Benedict's vision of a Europe "that must not only be an economic and political reality but must draw from its spiritual foundations." It cited the need for a "Christian identity" that contrasts with "widespread secularism."

Benedict's easy if somewhat shy manner with crowds, projecting the air of a university professor genuinely surprised at the multitudes flocking to his doorstep for his lectures, contrasted sharply with the image of a dour theologian in a Vatican office.

Among his early visitors was a leading dissident and former university colleague, the liberal theologian Hans Kueng, who fell from grace under John Paul.

Benedict also disciplined the founder of the conservative Legionaries of Christ, a John Paul protege who for decades has been dogged by sexual abuse allegations. Before becoming pope, Benedict had complained about the "filth" in the church, seen as a reference to priestly sex abuse.

Before his Germany trip in September, Benedict told a German TV interviewer that "Christianity, Catholicism isn't a collection of prohibitions." But in March he issued a 131-page "exhortation" to ensure that bishops, priests and the world's 1.2 billion faithful strictly follow church teaching. [Hey! The bishops themselves voted those conclusions!]

It included a nostalgic note about Latin, which has been in sharply declining use since the liberalizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. He suggested that the faithful be taught to recite the more common prayers in Latin.

The pope is scheduled to visit Brazil next month to make a major policy address to Latin American bishops. The Vatican set the stage for the trip with its censure of a prominent champion of liberation theology in the region, the Rev. Jon Sobrino, condemning some of his works as "erroneous or dangerous."

It was Benedict's first such action as pope, but as the Vatican's chief guardian of doctrinal orthodoxy for more than two decades he disciplined a number of theologians.

In September, he will resume his European travels with a pilgrimage to Austria, where Catholics have been traditionally wary of directives from Rome.

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

What is this modern philistinism about Latin? Until the first half of the 20th century, the ideal 'classical' or 'humanistic' education meant, among other things, learning Greek and Latin with your ABCs! Does no one appreciate a learning challenge anymore? Is there no thrill at all to the prospect that one might be able to read Julius Caesar, say, or Homer in the original?...Well, I suppose if journalists can't even get it right reporting on a document that is translated into their language, or even originally in their language, they would really be seriously challenged to get anything right in a foreign language, wouldn't they?

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 17/04/2007 21.23]

Pope's 'Jesus' book
a runaway success


VATICAN CITY, April 17, 2007 (AFP) - A book on Jesus by Pope Benedict XVI is a runaway success in Italy with 50,000 copies sold on the first day and a second edition already planned, the publishers Rizzoli said Tuesday.

"Jesus of Nazareth" was launched on the pontiff's 80th birthday on Monday and is billed as his answer to popular publications such as Dan Brown's best-selling "The Da Vinci Code". [As far as I know, it is only AFP so far that has 'billed' it as such, the ultimate trivialization of a serious, scholarly and spiritual book. I changed the title of the news item, which read "Pope's answer to Da Vinci Code a runaway success'.]

It aims to reconcile the historical figure of Christ with that of the Gospels.

The second edition of 70,000 would take the total print run to 420,000, said a statement from Rizzoli.

The book is being translated into 17 languages, and will soon be available in Latin America, where books by Spanish Jesuit and liberation theologian Jon Sobrino were recently severely criticised by the Vatican [For the specific reason that Sobrino's theology apparently tends to cast doubt on the divinity of Christ! How can you call yourself a Christian and diminish Christ that way?]

In his work, Benedict laments "the worst books, which destroy the figure of Jesus and dismantle faith, filled with the supposed results" of scriptural study.

This has been taken by many observers as a clear allusion to "The Da Vinci Code," which was criticised by the Roman Catholic Church. [And those 'observers' would be precisely those who have no awareness of what has been going on among theologians and Biblical scholars in this respect. Simple common sense would tell you that the masses who gobbled up Brown's book for the facile thriller that it is are hardly the ones who will go out and buy the book on Jesus!]

The pope began writing his book in 2003 when he was a cardinal and headed up the Vatican's doctrinal enforcement body.

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

Lella commented in her blog that the first-day sales figure was even more remarkable in that, generally, bookstores in Italy are closed on Monday mornings.

There must be a message somewhere if in Germany, the book on Jesus has outstripped the latest and last Harry Potter book on Amazon, and that it has taken off very well in Italy. Surely, those who are plunking down their euros for it know they are not going to get sheer entertainment (as I truly do from reading Harry Potter, for instance) and no cheap thrills as in an airplane page turner.

It's back to the quest for truth, I think. The ex-Marxists who turned to New Age fads in the late 60s and thereafter have been just as discontented with whatever it is they thought was 'the answer'- and so, there's a whole new generation 'searching.'

It would be nice to have a profile of the persons why buy the Jesus book - how many of them are Christians who simply want to reinforce and deepen their faith, and how many are people in search of answers.

Or it could be very simply that Jesus sells! I don't think the Bible has remained the all-time best-seller because of the Old Testament.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 1.40]

After saints, most-quoted author
in pope's new book is a U.S. rabbi

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY, April 17 (CNS) -- After the Gospel writers and the apostle Paul, the author most quoted in Pope Benedict XVI's new book is Rabbi Jacob Neusner, a U.S. professor of religion and theology.

In his book, "Jesus of Nazareth," released April 16 in Italian, German and Polish, Pope Benedict joined the literary dialogue that Rabbi Neusner invented for himself in his 1993 book, "A Rabbi Talks With Jesus."

The pope said that Rabbi Neusner's "profound respect for the Christian faith and his faithfulness to Judaism led him to seek a dialogue with Jesus."

Imagining himself amid the crowd gathered on a Galilean hillside when Jesus gave his Sermon on the Mount, Rabbi Neusner "listens, confronts and speaks with Jesus himself," the pope wrote.

"In the end, he decides not to follow Jesus," the pope wrote. "He remains faithful to that which he calls the 'eternal Israel.'"

Pope Benedict said Rabbi Neusner makes painfully clear the differences between Christianity and Judaism, but "in a climate of great love: The rabbi accepts the otherness of the message of Jesus and takes his leave with a detachment that knows no hatred."

The pope praised Rabbi Neusner for taking the Gospel of Jesus seriously and, in fact, more seriously than many modern Christian scholars do.

Jesus is the Son of God, the unique savior, and not simply a social reformer, a liberal rabbi or the teacher of a new morality, the pope said.

Pope Benedict wrote that in trying to understand who Jesus was and his relationship with his Jewish faith and with the Torah, the law given to Moses, Rabbi Neusner's book "was of great help."

Rabbi Neusner, a prolific author and professor at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y., told Catholic News Service in Rome that he did not want to talk about the pope's book until he had seen it. The English edition is scheduled for a May release.

In the introduction to the revised and expanded 2000 edition of his book, Rabbi Neusner wrote, "If I had been in the land of Israel in the first century, I would not have joined the circle of Jesus' disciples. ... If I heard what he said in the Sermon on the Mount, for good and substantive reasons I would not have followed him.

"Where Jesus diverges from the revelation by God to Moses at Mount Sinai, he is wrong and Moses is right," Rabbi Neusner wrote.

In Pope Benedict's treatment of the Sermon on the Mount, 18 of the 25 pages refer to Rabbi Neusner's book.

"More than any of the other interpretations of the Sermon on the Mount with which I am familiar, this debate between a believing Jew and Jesus, son of Abraham, conducted with respect and frankness, opened my eyes to the greatness of the word of Jesus and to the choice the Gospel places before us," the pope wrote.

Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna, presenting the pope's book at an April 13 Vatican conference, said reading Rabbi Neusner's book was "one of the reasons" Pope Benedict decided to write his.

"What Pope Benedict says about the book (by Rabbi Neusner) is so essential for understanding his own book about Jesus," the cardinal said.

"More than discussions about exegetical methods" used to understand what the Scriptures say about Jesus, Cardinal Schonborn said, the pope has "at heart the discussion with the rabbi."

"Rabbi Neusner is so important for the book of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI" precisely because he accepts what Jesus says about himself in the Gospels, the cardinal said.

German Father Joseph Sievers, director of the Cardinal Bea Center for Judaic Studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, where Rabbi Neusner has been a guest speaker, said the rabbi "takes very seriously the extraordinary claims of Jesus: He is not just a rabbi teaching the golden rule."

Both Rabbi Neusner and Pope Benedict, Father Sievers said, "have a high Christology," emphasizing the divinity of Christ even if Rabbi Neusner cannot accept Christ's claim.

"(Rabbi) Neusner, even when he spoke here, did not try to find easy solutions or to bridge gaps" between Christians and Jews, Father Sievers said.

In his book, Rabbi Neusner said he hoped to contribute to Christian-Jewish dialogue by taking Christian teaching and Jewish teaching seriously.

"It is one model for a starting point for dialogue - to recognize differences and not try to make them disappear or to hide them," Father Sievers said.

Father Sievers said Pope Benedict's new book is a further sign that he "is strong on Judaism, he respects it and he knows the contemporary scholarship."

"Basically, he loves a good discussion and so does (Rabbi) Neusner," he said.

Pope Benedict continues drawing huge crowds

We already reported this when the figures came out last weekend, but this has been updated to include today's audience, apparently !

Vatican, Apr. 17, 2007 (CWNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI continues to draw enormous crowds to the Vatican, official statistics show.

Nearly 3.4 million people have attended papal audiences or liturgical events at which the Pope presided during the 2nd year of his pontificate.

As the Holy Father nears the 2nd anniversary of his election on April 19, the prefecture of the pontifical household has released official figures for attendance at papal events during the past 12 months. The figures closely match the attendance statistics for the calendar year 2006, which showed total attendance of 3.2 million.

According to the Vatican's official figures, just over 1 million people have attended the Pope's regular Wednesday public audiences during the past year; another 1.46 have attended the Sunday Angelus audiences; 350,000 have been included in special group audiences; and over 536,000 have attended pontifical liturgies.

Pope Benedict's popularity compares favorably with that of his predecessor. In last two full years of his reign, Pope John Paul II drew 2.6 million people to audiences and liturgical events in 2003, and 2.2 million in 2004.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 18/04/2007 15.39]

This commentary appeared in the British newspaper the Daily Telegraph at about the same time as that unspeakable piece of dishonest journalism (cribbing quotations from another newspaper without attribution, among other things) by their Vatican correspondent Richard Owns - posted by Wulfrune last weekend. Providing this commentary is the editor-in-chief of the Catholic Herald, a weekly newspaper.


After a quiet and cautious start,
major reforms are on their way
By Damian Thompson


Many popes have celebrated their 80th birthday, but few have reached this milestone in such good form as Benedict XVI. Fighting form, perhaps.

After two cautious and successful years, in which he has surprised critics by writing about God's love rather than raging against contraception and homosexuality, the Pope is preparing a series of reforms of the Catholic Church.

Just how far he will go remains to be seen. But there are many nervous bishops at the moment - especially in this country.

The election of Joseph Ratzinger on April 19, 2005, deeply shocked liberals: the Rome correspondent of one Catholic magazine burst into tears in St Peter's Square. The new Pope realised that he had enemies in the Church, and decided not to play into their hands by, for example, instigating a witch hunt against gay clergy or reinstating the Latin (Tridentine) Rite of Mass.

Far from acting like a rottweiler, Benedict has manifested prayerful elegance - both in his writings and in church.

His pastoral, unexpectedly upbeat style has won him many friends, especially among non-Catholics who found John Paul II intimidating. When he attended a conference in support of the family in Spain last year, he failed to mention gay marriage or abortion - not because he does not oppose them, but because he felt that the Church should explain what it was for before it got round to explaining what it was against.

Recently, however, it has become clear that Benedict's agenda remains essentially the same as it was when he was Cardinal Ratzinger. When he was elected, he described himself as "a humble worker in the Lord's vineyard". Where John Paul II roamed far outside the vineyard, Benedict is staying close to the soil, pulling out weeds.

Those weeds are not so much people as bad habits - rambling sermons; smug, self-centred celebrations of the Mass; ugly music and architecture that, in his opinion, insults God.

Benedict is a bit like Rudy Giuliani, the former Mayor of New York: he believes that by fixing every broken window, fining every litter-lout, a city can be transformed. But his task is immense. It will not be easy to drag the lazy old precinct captains out of the donut shop.

Last month, the Pope issued a magnificently well-written document, Sacramentum Carititatis, ignored by the English bishops, which contained explicit instructions about the greater use of Latin and plain chant. Soon, liberal bishops in Europe and America could find their loyalty really put to the test.

Benedict is rumoured to be on the verge of removing restrictions on the celebration of the ancient Tridentine Rite, which liberals see as elitist. For two years, Catholics have wondered what sort of papacy this will turn out to be. Now they are about to find out.


================================================================
Another rare sensible piece in the Anglophone media is this one written for the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty, a Michigan-based group that promotes inter-religious discussions and seeks to educate religious leaders, business executives, profesors and researchers in economic principles to show that there can be interaction between economics as a development tool and the practice of religion.


April 18, 2007

Benedicts Global Agenda
by Samuel Gregg, D.Phil.

This week marks the second anniversary of Benedict XVI's papacy. Two years is but a blink of an eye in the history of this 2000 year-old institution. But it is enough to identify the particular lines being pursued by Catholicism' theologian-pope.

In one sense, the papacy's role is eternal, whoever occupies Peter's chair. It is to assist the Catholic Church in spreading the Christian message, to be the focus of unity for Catholics (particularly bishops) worldwide, and to explain and defend Catholicism's essential teachings.

For most people, that would seem more than enough to do. But each pope also brings specific issues to the position.

John Paul II, for example, became pope in 1978 with very clear ideas about the Church's relationship with the Communist world. To the entire Eastern Bloc, he began applying the same combination of prudence and moral toughness he had previously employed against Polands Communists.

Given his age, Benedict knows he has limited time to pursue his particular concerns. The irony is that each amounts to a grand project in itself.

Unquestionably Europe - especially Western Europe - ranks high in Benedict's concerns. Even before becoming pope, Joseph Ratzinger had been writing about European cultural trends for decades.

Since his election, Benedict has repeated many times that Europe seems 'tired', and referenced its collapsing demography as symptomatic of deeper problems. But he upped the ante recently by insisting that the apparent determination of Europe's political classes to continue denying Europe's Judeo-Christian historical roots amounted to Europe apostatizing from itself.

Though few recognized it at the time, Benedict's now-famous 2006 Regensburg address also[???] touched deeply on Europe. [It was explicitly addressed to Europe and the Western civilization it generated!]

This lecture - which will be remembered as one of this century's most provocative orations, akin to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's 1978 Harvard commencement address - identified the separation of faith and reason as central to the existential crisis of historical denial which Benedict believes is sapping Europe's civilizational genius.

It is not well understood that Benedict does not view this as an epic 'Catholicism-versus-the Enlightenment' clash.

Careful reading of Benedict's speeches demonstrates his belief that many Enlightenment thinkers made positive contributions to Europe's development, especially with respect to religious liberty. Reason, Benedict writes, needs faith to check reason's potential for hubris, while faith needs reason to purify religion of unreasonable behavior.

Which brings us to another subject high on Benedict's agenda - Islam.

Catholicism and Islam are the world's fastest growing religions. They co-exist alongside and within each other. Significant Muslim minorities now live in Christianity's European hinterlands. Large numbers of Christians have lived in Islamic countries for centuries.

Early in his papacy, Benedict made clear his dissatisfaction with the character of official Catholic-Muslim dialogue. At Regensburg, he dramatically moved the conversation beyond the bromides all too common in ecumenical/inter-religious circles by publicly asking the question few had hitherto dared ask. Is violence somehow intrinsic to Islam, or is it an aberration?

The less-than coherent response from much of the Muslim world and many Westerners - evident unease that Benedict even posed the question indicates he struck a nerve, but also forced open a long overdue debate.

The stakes are not simply intellectual. Benedict was reminding Europe that the more it trivializes religion, the less it possesses the capacity to understand some of its own and Islam's problems. He was also attempting to facilitate a conversation about Islam and violence among Muslims themselves - an argument with profound implications for international stability.

The same debates also created room for Benedict to press another point that concerns him: the legal and informal restrictions endured by Christians living in Islamic countries. Benedict's 2006 visit to Turkey highlighted to the world the constraints upon the religious liberty of Christians living in this ostensibly secular Muslim country.

Benedict is not asking for some form of privileged status reminiscent of 19th century colonialism for Christians in Muslim countries. He is merely requesting reciprocity: that Christians in Muslim nations experience the same religious liberty enjoyed by Muslims living in nations with Christian heritages.

The same insistence upon religious liberty underpins Benedict's outreach to China, something no-one predicted as a priority for his papacy.

With millions of Chinese embracing Christianity as China opens economically to the world, Benedict believes the time is ripe for a Vatican-China rapprochement: one that respects China's sensitivities about sovereignty while ensuring Chinese Catholics can be in open communion with Rome. Progress is presently stalled. But a conversation considered inconceivable even five years ago continues.

In the midst of all this, Benedict continues to draw to St. Peter's Square crowds larger than those who came to view his predecessor. By all accounts, many go less to see Benedict and more to listen to what he has to say.

Love or loathe him, it is difficult to ignore the elderly Bavarian scholar who speaks quietly but whose voice is a big stick.

==============================================================
I have only one quibble - two, actually - about Dr. Gregg's piece: that thoughtless unthinking cliche about people going less to see Benedict than to hear him. Of course they're there to see him - every Catholic would like to see the Pope 'live' at least once! they're there for the total experience. And no one goes back home to say, "Guess what? I heard the Pope today!" No - it's "I saw the Pope!" or "I touched the Pope!" Or "I took a picture of him when he was that close!" etc.

My second quibble: I find it very strange to read Papino described as 'an elderly Bavarian scholar'. The 'elderly' grates - I guess, because from the beginning, he never struck me as 'elderly': his outlook and his appearance and his movements have been so youthful all this time.

Dr. Samuel Gregg is Director of Research at the Acton Institute and author of On Ordered Liberty (2003), A Theory of Corruption (2004), Banking, Justice and the Common Good (2005), and The Commercial Society (2007).

Here are two reports on the general audience and the catechesis today. I have posted a translation of the full catechesis in AUDIENCE AND ANGELUS TEXTS.

Search for truth succeeds
only through faith in Jesus, pope says
By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service


VATICAN CITY, April 18 (CNS) - The human search for truth can succeed only through faith in Jesus Christ, who is truth, Pope Benedict XVI said.

"Faith in Christ grants the true knowledge which the ancient philosophers had sought through the use of reason," the pope said April 18 at his weekly general audience.

Continuing his audience talks about the early church fathers and theologians, Pope Benedict focused his remarks on St. Clement of Alexandria, who was born in the middle of the second century.

The theologian's writings, the pope said, outline how a believing Christian can and should use both faith and reason to "reach an intimate knowledge of the truth, which is Jesus Christ, the word of God."

"Only this knowledge of the person, who is truth, is true gnosis, the Greek word for knowledge or intelligence," Pope Benedict said.

The joining of faith and reason, he said, "leads to true philosophy, that is, the real understanding of the path to take in one's life."

Pope Benedict said St. Clement explained how knowledge of Christ must become "a living reality; it is not just a theory. It is a life force, a union with transforming love."

Knowledge of Christ is not simply an intellectual exercise, he said, but rather it implies the experience of "love that opens one's eyes, transforms the person and creates communion with the Logos, the divine word, who is truth and life."

The unity of knowledge and love of Christ leads to contemplation and, ultimately, "union with God," he said.

St. Clement explained how "the ultimate aim of human life is to become similar to God," the pope said. "We are created in the image and likeness of God, but this is also a challenge, a journey. Our final aim and ultimate destination is to become similar to God."

The pope said the fact that people are created in God's image allows them "to know the divine reality."

Knowledge of God, he said, comes first through faith but grows through the practice of moral virtues.

St. Clement insisted that correct moral conduct must accompany the intellectual search for truth and for God, he said.

"The two go together because one cannot know something without living it and cannot live something without knowing it," said the pope.

Pope Benedict said he hoped all Christians, but especially theologians and religious educators, would see St. Clement as a model for bringing faith and reason together and for conducting a dialogue with modern philosophy.

At the end of the audience, two days after the pope's 80th birthday, dozens of visitors presented him with birthday cards and presents, including a huge cake and several smaller tortes delivered by a group of German pastry chefs.


Here is the AsiaNews report:

VATICAN
Pope: man needs faith and reason
to realize his aim to become similar to God

Vatican City, April 18 (AsiaNews) – “Man is called to become like God” and he has “the complementary wings of faith and reason” in order to reach that truth, which is Jesus Christ.

Benedict XVI returned once again to a familiar and dear theme today, illustrating the figure of Clement of Alexandria, “Master of dialogue between faith and reason” in the second century, to over 45 thousand people present in St Peter’s square for the general audience.

In a sunbathed square, still dressed in flowers from birthday celebrations, on the eve of the second anniversary of his election – provoking the Pope to observe a “festive climate” - the Pontiff sustained that the one true philosophy is faith, “true knowledge of the road to take in life”.

Illustrating Clement Alexandria’s works which “accompany the baptised catechumen’s journey step by step”, Benedict XVI attributed him with having “rebuilt” the second great occasion for dialogue between Christianity and Greek philosophy, after the first occasion, conducted by Paul “failed in may ways”.

In his thoughts, reason leads to knowledge, in Greek gnosi, but only Knowledge of the truth which is Christ Jesus, is real knowledge: “authentic gnosis is a development of the faith within the soul that he has converted”.

But “knowledge of Christ is not just a thought, it is also love which opens the eyes and transforms man and creates union with Logos”, which is God. This is how contemplation is reached.

But in order to arrive at the contemplation of God “the practice of virtues” is also needed; intellectual knowledge is not enough: in the journey towards perfection, Clement “gives as much importance to moral requirements as to intellectual ones” and as a result “good deeds must accompany one on one’s life journey, just as a shadow follows the body: they are never separate, true gnosis cannot coexist with evil deeds”.

According to Clement, the heart of a “true gnostic” contains two virtues: “freedom from passions” and love which “assures an intimate union with God and with contemplation”.

“Love – continued the Pope – gives perfect peace, and enables the true gnostic to face even the greatest of sacrifices, even the supreme sacrifice, and thus helps him on step by step towards the heights of virtues. Thus the ideal of ancient philosophy, the freedom from one's passions, is redefined by Clement and joined together with love, in the man’s constant journey to liken himself to God, which represents the journey of knowledge of true gnosis”.

Thus, in the Pope’s words, we come to what Clement defines as man’s primary aim: “to liken himself to God” and this “is possible because we are made in the likeness of God” at the moment of creation.

At the end of the audience Pope Benedict XVI blessed the “John Paul II” torch of peace which will be carried from Bethlehem to Jerusalem in a marathon-pilgrimage on April 23to 28th.

Palestinian and Israeli students will join the IV edition of the run along with 200 Italian students from across Italy.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/04/2007 2.11]

Here is a translation of the official communique by the Holy See this morning on the meeting yesterday between Pope beneict XVI and the UN's top official.






On the afternoon of April 18, His Holiness Benedict XVI received a call from the Secretary-General of the United Nations, the Honorable Ban Ki-Moon.

The audience continues the series of meetings by the Popes, particularly by the late John Paul II, with the UN Secretaries-General as a sign, among other things, of the appreciation of the Holy See for the central role played by the UN in maintaining peace and promoting the development of peoples.

The new UN Secretary-General's meeting with the Holy Father comes during his first visits to Africa, Europe and the Middle East, a few months after he took office on January 1, 2007.

He also came to present an official invitation for the Pope to visit United Nations headquarters in New York City.

His Holiness and the Secretary General discussed matters of common interest, such as restoring confidence in multilateralism and strengthening dialog among cultures, as well as critical areas of the international situation which deserve particular attention.

They discussed the contribution that the Catholic Church and the Holy See could make - through their particularly identity and with their own means - to the work of the United Nations in seeking to solve present conflicts and reaching agreements among nations.

Following the Pontifical audience, the Secretary-General also had a conversation with the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone who was accompanied by the Secretary for Relations with Other States, Mons. Dominique Mamberti.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/04/2007 14.12]

GOD BLESS POPE BENEDICT XVI!
We celebrate the day you came into our lives -
a light for the world, 'dolce Cristo in terra.'



Here is a translation of the front-page editorial in Osservatore Romano today:

The spring of the intrepid
Helmsman of the church

Two Petrine occasions being lived together as a single intense celebration: The joy of the People of God over the 80th birthday of Benedict XVI continued and was manifest yesterday on a sunny spring morning at the General Audience, on the eve of the second anniversary of his Pontificate.

A spring that is not only 'metereological' but above all, spiritual and ecclesial, enveloped St. Peter's Square with its radiant light. A spring that pulsated with faith and interior joy on this particular Wednesday, still resounding with the loving wishes of all around the world who wished him Happy Birthday and the tens of thousands of pilgrims who had come again to be near the Successor of Peter, honoring him with overflowing filial affection.

Spring is the climate in St. Peter's Square where more than ever today, the heart of the Church beats. Springlike are the colors on the Square which are a palette of the variegated liveliness of the faithful in all their affection and warmth.

'Let us praise and thank God for the gift of Papa Benedetto' says one of the many many streamers enthusastically raised on the Square. A few words with the simple and boundless echo of a universal prayer.



And springlike is the spirit of youthful freshness with which the Pope is experiencing these days. Springlike is this season of his heart and his life. Springlike is the spirit of this '80-year-old youth' who - with the gentle smile and sense of fatherhood that he conveyed to the world from the first day of his pontificate - has guided the helm of Peter's boat without sparing himself.

"Most beloved Holy Father, we are with you always with joy and love in the vineyard of the Lord", another streamer reads. The prayerful affection of a celebratory people accompanies the intrepid Helmsman of the Church at every step along his way.

The stamp has been out since March 18, but the formal presentation was done today.



Archbishop Erwin Josef Ender, Apostolic Nuncio to Germany (L) and German Cardinal Karl Lehmann (R) share a laugh at the Vatican embassy in Berlin, April 19, 2007, after the presentation by German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck (C) of a special edition stamp to mark the occasion of the 80th birthday of Pope Benedict XVI. REUTERS/Fabrizio Bensch (GERMANY)

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/04/2007 17.30]

GOD BLESS POPE BENEDICT XVI!
We celebrate the day you came into our lives -
a light for the world, 'dolce Cristo in terra.'



Before proceeding to translate some of the editorials and commentaries about the Pope's annviersary today, allow me to indulge myself by re-posting here one of the best immediate reactions I ever read to the election of Joseph Ratzinger as Pope. I did not discover it until a few months back, at which time I posted it in the thread THE EXPERIENCE OF APRIL 19, 2005.

Roger Kimball, who is editor and publisher of The New Criterion, wrote this on the magazine's blog ARMAVIRUMQUE (Arms and the Man) the day after Pope Benedict was elected. It is a most unusual tribute among the many excellent ones that were written about Benedict when he was elected.
---------------------------------------------------------------


4.20.2005

The new Benedict
[Posted 6:57 AM by Roger Kimball]

It looks like the philosopher Alisdair MacIntyre got his wish, at least for now.

In his book After Virtue (1981; 2nd ed. 1984), MacIntyre offered the "disquieting suggestion" that we in the West live among the unorganized fragments of a shattered world view and that we have "very largely, if not entirely, lost our comprehension" of morality.

Hence the "after" in his title: as traditionally conceived - as conceived, that is by Aristotle - a virtuous life was first of all a life dedicated to the practice of certain substantive virtues: courage, prudence, magnanimity, and so on.

We moderns, fearful of being "judgmental" - who's to say what counts as prudent behavior? Are there not many versions of "the good life for man"? - have tended to reject Aristotle and have attempted to found morality not on substantive virtues but on more or less formal rules: follow the procedures, we think, and morality (near enough) will follow (cf. Mill, Rawls, et al.).

It was the operation not so much of an invisible hand but a wilful act of moral prestidigitation. The choice, as MacIntrye saw it, was twofold.

On the one hand, we had to choose between Aristotle and Nietzsche - between a morality that embraced the traditional virtues and one that, proclaiming their bankruptcy, sought to "raze to the ground the inherited structures of moral belief and argument."

On the other hand, MacIntyre argued, we had to choose between the utopian pessimism of Trotsky - that rancid utopianism that comes to despairing Marxists; and efforts to resuscitate that older, Aristotelean tradition of morality that had apparently -but only apparently - been discredited by the technologically audacious march or modernity.

"If," MacIntyre concluded, the tradition of the virtues was able to survive the horrors of the last dark ages, we are not entirely without grounds for hope."

"This time however the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have already been governing us for quite some time. And it is our of consciousness of this that constitutes part of our predicament. We are waiting not for a Godot, but for another - doubtless very different - St. Benedict."

Well, perhaps the elevation of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger to Pope Benedict XVI is a fulfillment of MacIntyre's wish. We shall see.

In the meantime, although it is unpleasant to say "I told you so," I have to say "I told you so." Cardinal Ratzinger was my own first choice to be Pope and I always thought he was a chief contender.

I forget most of the many reasons adduced by friends who patiently explained to me why it would never happen - age came into it, as did Ratzinger's orthodoxy.

The choice has not, of course, pleased everyone. The New York Times for example, is clearly unhappy with Ratzinger, as are many libertarian commentators. Poor Andrew Sullivan is quite beside himself ("still in shock," "the dread rises") and seems to think that Ratzinger's elevation marks the advent of Attila the Hun crossed with the Grand Inquisitor.

My advice: Relax. Pope Benedict is an orthodox Catholic whose reflections (as he put it in his book Introduction to Christianity) "finally lead of their own accord to the words in which Paul named the main supporting pillars of Christianity: 'So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of them is love." That's not so bad, is it?

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

How very prescient Roger Kimball was!

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/04/2007 20.03]

Here is the translation of a commentary from Il Tempo:


More than 50,000
at papal audience yesterday
By MAURIZIO GALLO


Yesterday, there were more than 50,000. For two years now, it has been this way. Every Wednesday and every Sunday, St. Peter's Square is filled with the faithful, with enthusiasm, with joy.

They come from many places in Italy, from beyond its borders, from remote villages in the north and south of the European continent, from around the world. They come to listen to the Pope, to receive his blessing, or to participate in the Masses he celebrates.

At the beginning, some called it 'the Wojtyla effect', explaining the crowds as a carryover from the Polish Pope's charisma to the benefit of his successor. But that wasn't explanation enough.

In terms of 'audience' [presence at the Vatican], Benedict XVI has surpassed John Paul II, catalyzing the attention and participation of the faithful at every even when he is present.

Numbers don't lie. From April 2006 to April 19 2007, some 3,400,000 have attended various Papal events at the Vatican and Castel Gandolfo.

"The intrepid Helmsman of the Church", as L'Osservatore Romano calls him, attracts the faithful as much as - or more - than did the great and beloved John Paul II.

AAfter the Mass that formally began his Petrine Ministry, participants in his audiences, liturgies and Angelus prayers have been growing compared to the previous year, up to the record number in yesterday's general audience.

This April alone, the attendance at the Papal Masses held in St. Peter's Square (Palm Sunday, Memorial Mass for John Paul, Easter Sunday, and the birthday Mass on April 15) totalled about 250,000.

The figures give us a measure of the phenomenon, but only quantitatively. One must be at St. Peter's Square for one of these biweekly 'events' (as they deserve to be called) to realize the enthusiastic fervor with which they are experienced.

Certainly, the Church is under attack, in Italy and elsewhere. For the first time in recent history, the president of the Italian bishops conference requires a police escort, and yesterday, we had news of yet another violent attack against Christians in Turkey.

Islamist fundamentalism lives off the daily massacres in Iraq, Afghanistan and other Arab countries, recruiting new proselytes to terrorism as a way to conquer the world.

Against these dangerous drifts to violence and intolerance, the Roman Catholic Church represents one of the few bulwarks, and
perhaps, that is why the faithful are gathering in greater numbers to seek refuge behind its 'walls', in its peaceful spirituality. They see an oasis of interior serenity in the message that Christ gives to whoever is ready to accept it.

But the attraction is present also because - like John Paul II, and perhaps more than he - Papa Ratzinger interprets their need and has made himself the bearer of their hopes. That is why numbers alone do not tell the story. Not the 600,000 birthday greetings that he has received so far. Nor the choirs and musical bands that serenade and celebrate him with great gusto.

But something symbolic may come to our aid. Something emblematic of this Pope of love, who sent Caritas of Rome (their soup kitchen at Colle Oppio) a giant birthday cake he was given for his birthday. Something to sweeten the palate (and the life) of the true 'people of Christ' - the poor, the homeless and the hungry.

Il Tempo, 19 aprile 2007

GOD BLESS POPE BENEDICT XVI!
We celebrate the day you came into our lives -
a light for the world, 'dolce Cristo in terra.'


From among the wealth of available commentary in the Italian press on the second anniversary of Benedict's Pontificate, I have chosen to translate first this tribute by Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, Archbishop of Bologna, which appeared in the birthday special of Avvenire on April 15, because it sets the appropriate spiritual climate in which we are celebrating these days of significance. It resonates a lot also with the article posted above..

The Pope's Magisterium of love
By Cardinal Carlo Caffarra
Archbishop of Bologna

On Monday, April 16, Pope Benedict XVI turns 80. May it be, above all, a moment of prayer. A prayer of praise and of thanksgiving to the Lord for the gift He has given us of such a great Pope; of invocation to the Holy Spirit that He may "grant him long life and good health, and keep him, for the sake of His Holy church, as leader and shepherd of the people of God."

This is also an occasion to reflect on the ministry of the Holy Father and his Magisterium, to remind us more profoundly of what this is.

The great and growing number of people who come to listen to him shows how Christians appreciate the teaching of the faith by Benedict XVI - profundity with simplicity, expository clarity in presenting great theological themes.

The fundamental model for evangelization and ministry proposed by the Holy Father is the "great Yes" that God has pronounced in Jesus Christ, in favor of man. of human life, human love, human intelligence and human freedom.

The Pope showed in Verona that this 'great Yes' must be reflected in "the strong unity between a faith that is friendly to intelligence and lving that is characterized by reciprocal love among men and caring attention to the poor and the suffering."

The friendly relationship of faith and reason - which was the great and true theme of the lecture in Regensburg - demands widening the spaces for reason, proposing a new and fecund encounter of the Christian faith with the reasoning of our times.

But to re-establish that relationship requires that the faith should always know how to express its rationality: and so the great themes of truth, beauty and the 'livability' of the Christian proposition are central in Benedict's Magisterium. The people of God are responding to his call because he makes them feel the 'warmth' of a friendship between God and man.

And here we come to the central point of the Benedictine Magisterium: the God in whom we believe, the God of Jesus Christ, is the God of love (Deus caritas est), the God who loves man so much 'to the point of 'turning against Himself' in the Cross of His only-begotten Son.

Ultimate Reason, the God-Logos, is also the God-Love who enters the history of man, and "only a God who loves us to the point of taking upon Himself our wounds and our suffering, especially those that are innocent, is worthy of faith" {Urbi et Orbi message, Easter 2007).

I cannot conclude without noting that few or none of the major media base their reporting in the context of these fundamental lines and themes of the Pope's Magisterium.

But we the faithful should not tire of drinking from this fountain of living water, through which the only Word that is eternal gets to us.

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

A cursory review of the many commentaries in the Italian press - despite the fact that their daily reporting about the Church anf the Pope is generally hostile because of the political implications of the Catholic positions on social issues of the day - shows that they consider the popularity of Benedict XVI as the litmus test of his Papacy - his effect on the faithful, therefore. In contrast, Anglophone commentaries generally tend to ignore this, or give it cursory notice, choosing to focus instead on the things this Pope does not do for Catholic dissidents and liberals.

Here is the view from korazym.org, an online news and Catholic affairs agency originated by Italian youth who responded enthusiastically to John Paul II's original call for young Catholics to be the 'sentinels of tomorrow':


'Habemus papam'
two years later

On April 19, 2005, the white smoke. Now two years later, the evidence and the surprises in two years of a Pontificate. Simplicity and popularity, diplomacy and the call for a joyous Christianity, are the features from which to review two years with Benedict XVI.

By Cristian Glori


According to the image he was saddled with as a cardinal, Joseph Ratzinger would be spending his time as Pope issuing condemnations and proclaiming anathemas.

But despite this false image that many still persist in attrbuting to him, Benedict XVI does none of those [nor did he do them as Prefect of the CDF].

His criticisms of the world and the ills of modernity have the calm tone of someone who knows how to argue his points and who proposes lucid analyses that can shed light both on his thinking and on the the reality of facts.

It is a Pope quite different from expectation that the world has seen, going into the third year of his pontificate - two years since that 19th of April 2005 when he presented himself to the world as 'a humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord.'

The humility persists, along with his continuous requests for prayers to help him carry out the weighty mission he was called to do: a true second life for a man who, at 78, did not imagine a passage so decisive for himself and for the life of the Church itself.

The words of Benedict XVI strike home, and the faithful follow him. The cliche of a Pope being abandoned by his flock [favorite image peddled by Catholic dissidents and secular liberals] is simply belied by the eloquence of numbers: attendance at his two regular weekly appointments with the faith ful at St. Peter's Square - the Sunday Angelus and the Wednesday general audience - has been systematically double the numbers registered in the final years of John Paul's Pontificate, and he was the Pope of records. But no longer in this respect.

Obviously, there is something that attracts and appeals in the personality of this Pope [OH WHAT AN UNDERSTATEMENT!], and his simplicity in speaking about God and Christ even from his intellectual heights has not been unnoticed!

This is the Pope who exhorts men to ask themselves about their faith using reason, and who addresses non-Christians in terms of rationality, and reminds them of the logic, beyond the historicity, of Christ as God-become-man.

A Pope capable of surprising the world: who dedicated to the relationship between faith and reason the most famous of his speeches in two years as Pope [the lectio magistralis at Regensburg); who has stressed on several occasions the need for consistency of action among Catholics who are involved in public life; who, in Verona, indicated to the church in Italy the way to make its presence felt actively in the world; who does not miss an occasion to remind the faithful of the essential importance of the family as a social institution, and of the perfect coherence and harmony between the search for peace and the defense of human life, any human life.

The first year of his Pontificate came under the rubric of managing the difficult legacy of a great Pope. And this was most visible in his relationship with young people [his first trip abroad was for World Youth Day in Cologne] and in his constant efforts to keep the connection alive, characterized by the great importance given to rites and sacraments [there is a clear continuity between the Eucharistic vigil in Cologne and the penitential liturgy for the youth last Maundy Thursday, instead of what had been a customary celebration with song and dance].

His visit to the places most associated with John Paul II in Poland last May opened a year that was rich with events, both planned and unplanned:

Europe and its self-confrontation, on his visit to his native Bavaria; diplomacy and the art of mediation in the war between Israel and Lebanon in the summer of 2006; the critical moment of rupture with Islam after the Regensburg lecture, which was completely turned around by his visit to Turkey - theater for both the ecumenical outreach to Patriarch Bartholomew I and the face-off with the Islamic world.

And the latter has become ground once more for action by the Secretariat of State, under new leadership in Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone. At the same time, the closeness of the Holy See to the Italian Church has been underscored with the appointment of Archbishop Bagnasco who shares the ideas of his predecessor Cardinal Ruini about the role of the Church in public life. [I don't think it so much the 'closeness of the Holy See to the Italian Church' as the fact that the Pope is also Primate of Italy and Bishop of Rome!]

The Pope has symbolically shown his attention for the weak and the needy in his visit to the juvenile wards at Casal del Marmo detention center, and to the soup kitchen of Caritas in Rome.

Caritas - love which is God himself, Him who gives identity to man and urges him to love his neighbor - is, of course, the theme of his only encyclical so far, a document in which eros and agape are seen conjoined in testimony of the great power of love.

Love and Truth - truth being the other word constantly used by the Pope. Along with his reminder to the faithful, particularly the youth, of the essence of Christianity: the joy of being Christian, the certainty that Christ does not take anything away from the beauty of life, that the Church does not imprison the spirit in a series of prohibitions but asks it to be open to the greatness of God's love.

Benedict XVI will persevere along these lines, which concern many topics of currency, whether from the international point of view (relations with China remain a priority on gthe Chruch's agenda) or internally (the anticipated motu proprio on the pre-conciliar Mass as an extraordinary rite alongside the ordinary Novus Ordo, as well as the recent Post-Synodal apostolic exhortation, Sacramentum caritatis).

The Pope has given us all the indications: at 80, there remains a lot of work for him to do.

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

Here is a translation of a signed editorial in Il Foglio from 4/17/06, in which editor Giuliano Ferrara offers a fresh take on Pope Benedict as thinker - and a thoughtful word portrait of the personality of the Pope that shows a rare attentiveness and personal appreciation on the part of the author. He shows how it is possible to admire Benedict XVI even if one does not believe in God and purely from extra-religious considerations.


Best wishes and congratulations to him
who has liberated us from the dictatorship of habit
By Giuliano Ferrara


People come to hear him. In great numbers, and growing. Amazing, in a way. Because this 80-year-old is a fragile figure endowed with gifts that are far more academic than pastoral.

He can be hieratic, certainly - but even then, his manner is measured, respectful, neat, Bavarian, at once friendly and very serious. Nothing of forceful authoritativeness or grandeur, in the sense of a superhuman and messianic force.

Rather, he never loses a sweetness and a rare elegance that is almost courtly - an inexorable expression, contemporary but anti-modern, of the concept of reason as an antidote to the abuses of logic. (All these are things an assembly of 19th century socialists gathered in a rather sad thermal spa and contemptuous of a philosopher Pope, would never understand!)

He is a liberator, Benedict XVI. He has liberated us from the domination of gossip, from the 'dictatorship of habit', as he writes on page 116 of his new book on Jesus of Nazareth.

He has stripped us of every form of subjection to the Left Bank of secularists, or those self-proclaimed maitres-de-penser [masters of thought] settled on the right bank of the Tiber [I suppose he means the anti-Church liberals of La Repubblica].

For more than half a century, he has been a dominant player in the field of interpretations, that dialectical game of German scholars, on what is significant and signifying, and the philosophy of language. He has diverted himself in the labyrinth of thought like an allegorical player, but proposes a simple, liturgical purpose: to search for truth, if he has not already found it.

When he speaks of love, one feels its power, and when he uses the power of words, one feels his love. He dialogs but does not drown in the conversation, nor waste time in the mimic ballet of perennial listening; in conversation, he avoids whatever smacks of proselytism, but he preaches conversion with an instinctive ability to persuade, calling attention to Christianity's 'heart of flesh' but never once neglecting the demands of the mind.

To men and women who not only believe they can achieve their own salvation but also make themselves the yardstick for the salvation of the world in the name of a moralism of peace and concern for the poor, he explains that the Beatitudes are great paradoxes that require Christological reading - ecclesial but rational - because in Christ, there is something that is epic, joyously Homeric, a thunder that shatters arrogance.

He has the manner of someone who has in the palm of his hand - humbly as befits the servant of the servants of God - the most interesting reading now in circulation, written in perfect submission to the mystery of Christ.

He preaches, he teaches, unafraid of the beauty of the norm as it is known to the bimillennial army of Christians who began by rebelling against the emptiness of ancient laws as they received them.

He thinks Nietsche was a desperate rascal, despite the battles he may have won, and even if "much from him has passed into modern consciousness and determines in great part how life is perceived these days."

At the beginning of a new century, not to mention a new millennium, nothng is more relevant than this gigantic settlement of accounts in contemporary thinking, of making it fit reality.

For everything else, there is time, but with Ratzinger and what he stands for, let us make haste! And a gentle Papolatry will not harm even stray dogs without leashes.

We wish him all the best.

Il Foglio 17 aprile 2007

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

To better place Ferrara's editorial in context:
Ferrara, after a past that began in the Communist Party (his father was a communist senator), left the Reds to become a socialist and was elected to the European Parliament as a socalist, but eventually joined the first Berlusconi government as minister for legislative relations, as he turned increasingly conservative. In 2001, although a non-believer, he declared himself openly in favor of Judeo-Christian principles as a necessity in society, and has since become, like Marcello Pera, one of Italy's leading 'convinced atheists' who nevertheless dispute the liberal idea of secularism that would exclude religion from the public sphere. He is considered Italy's leading exponent of the ideas of Leo Strauss, the guru of American neo-conservatives.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 1.06]

As I was unable to spend much time on Forum work yesterday, let me not neglect the other big story in the Wednesday Italian papers, which was based on the briefing given at the Vatican fon the Pope's pastoral visit this weekend.

I posted the detailed programs for Vigevano and Pavia on teh PAPAL TRAVLES thread last weekend, direct from their diocesan websites.

Firs, here is ZENIT's story, and I may post a translation later of at least one Italian story, for the record.

Benedict XVI to Visit Augustine's Tomb

VATICAN CITY, APRIL 17, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI will go on pilgrimage to pray before the tomb of St. Augustine, whom he considers one of the great teachers of his life.

The Pope will visit the Italian dioceses of Vigevano and Pavia this Saturday and Sunday and while there, visit the tomb of the bishop of Hippo.

St. Augustine was a fascination for the young Father Joseph Ratzinger, who dedicated his doctoral thesis to the saint's ecclesiology.

Augustinian Father Vittorino Grossi spoke with the press about the Pope's studies of St. Augustine.

The priest mentioned that the Pope has "manifested his love for St. Augustine, explaining that Augustine's theology fascinated him because his principal objective was not a system of theology -- even though it is that, and a good one - but the human person and his concrete existence."

"Joseph Ratzinger, after being elected Pope, frequently recalls the thought of St. Augustine in his ministry, referring above all to the Hippo bishop's commentaries on the Psalms," Father Grossi added.

The Holy Father will visit Augustine's tomb, located in the Basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro in Pavia. The prior-general of the Augustinians, Father Robert Prevost, invited Benedict XVI to visit shortly after his election as Pope.

Father Prevost explained that the visit will mark the blessing of the cornerstone of the cultural center that the order is building, which will be named after the Pope, "due to the strong spiritual and theological links which unite Benedict XVI with the Father of the Church."

The pilgrimage also marks the 750th anniversary of Pope Alexander IV's bull "Licet Ecclesiae Catholicae," which unified the Augustinians.

Augustinian Father Giustino Casciano, prior of the monastery of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro, also mentioned that the pilgrimage dates nearly coincide with the anniversary of Augustine's conversion and baptism, April 24.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office, recalled: "The urn with the mortal remains of the saint has four locks, guarded by the bishop, the prior of the basilica, the mayor of the city and the council of the cathedral, thereby demonstrating that Augustine belongs to all of the components of the city, without distinction."

Meanwhile, here's a good story on the Pope's pilgrimage to St. Augustine's tomb from a Canadian newspaper today.

Paying homage to Saint Augustine:
In Pavia, one great theologian-bishop
is visiting Another
By Father Raymond J. De Souza
National Post
Thursday, April 19, 2007


This week, Pope Benedict XVI celebrated both his 80th birthday and, today, his second anniversary as pope. A special Mass at St. Peter's last Sunday marked the two occasions, and the gifted pianist attended a classical musical concert in his honour at the Vatican on Monday night.

I suspect, though, that Benedict will consider his visit this weekend to the Italian town of Pavia a more special gift still, for that is where Saint Augustine - the fifth-century North African convert, bishop and doctor of the Church - is buried. Across the centuries, one great theologian-bishop is going to visit another.

St. Augustine is more than the principal intellectual influence on Benedict; the greatest of the first millennium's Christian scholars is the Pope's constant intellectual companion. His preaching and teaching are unfailingly leavened with Augustinian quotations.

If John Paul II was a great philosopher pope, teaching the wisdom of Saint Thomas Aquinas to the late 20th century, Benedict is doing the same for Augustine in the 21st.

"Augustine defines the essence of the Christian religion," then-Cardinal Ratzinger once said. "He saw Christian faith, not in continuity with earlier religions, but rather in continuity with philosophy as a victory of reason over superstition."

It is a favourite theme of Pope Benedict, one that provided the high point of his papacy thus far, the world-shaking address at Regensburg last year, when he argued that to act contrary to right reason was to act contrary to God - a critical message in an age of religously motivated violence.

Benedict argues that God's revelation of Himself to Abraham began a definitive break with the world of pagan superstition and the fearful gods of the ancient world. That revelation, first to the children of Israel, finds its fulfilment in Jesus Christ, who shows forth the Father's mercy in offering Himself to atone for our sins.

The contrast with gods of the ancient world could not be more complete. Whether the pagan gods of the Roman Empire, the gods of Greek mythology, the Egyptian gods of the river or the harvest, or, in this part of the world, the gods of the Aztecs or Mayas, the ancient world was dominated by gods who were feared and needed to be appeased, and whose arbitrary power could be exercised to subordinate man, or destroy him altogether.

Benedict follows St. Augustine in seeing the Christian logos, the divine Word that rationally orders all things, an entirely different conception of God. Here is a God who is rational, whose creation reflects the order and goodness of right reason, and who can be known by human beings, made in His image and able to reason themselves.

And even more extraordinary than that, this God revealed Himself as one who is love - a love that creates, redeems and calls His creation to Himself. The logos of philosophy becomes the God who is love, as Benedict put it in his first encyclical.

The God of Judeo-Christian revelation is not merely the god of the philosophers, acting as a remote first cause or principle of motion. Rather this God is a rational person, the principle of rationality and truth. This God can be approached by human creatures in truth - both the natural truths of science, and the revealed truths of faith.

The ancient gods of the Nile or Mount Olympus, with their need for power and domination, had no standing in the world of philosophy. They belonged to a world of superstition. St. Augustine demonstrated how the God of Abraham belonged the world of philosophy, but pointed beyond it to the world of salvific love.

Benedict argued at Regensburg that the meeting of Biblical faith with Greek philosophy constitutes an essential part of Christian revelation. It was St. Augustine in whom that encounter was lived most deeply in the early Church.

Augustine is also a saint - one who not only knows about the things of God, but loves God and follows Him. This too, Benedict argues, is consistent with reason, for what other reason could there be for an omnipotent and self-sufficient God to create angels and human beings and animals and lakes and mountains except out of love? The ancient philosophers sought after the cause of being. Biblical faith responds that the reason for being is nothing other than divine love. And the reasonable response to love is to love in return.

Observers have wondered why Benedict's first two years have not been focused on contemporary controversies, but on preaching the love of God, and looking repeatedly to the first centuries of the Church for wisdom and teaching. Perhaps it's because Benedict knows that the world today lacks confidence in the possibility of reason to know the truth, and in the possibility of true love. The man buried in Pavia is one of the great witnesses that in God this world's restless heart can indeed find both.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 3.48]

Here is a translation of a story in ZENIT's Italian service today:


ROME, April 19 (ZENIT.org)- Two close friends of Pope Benedict XVI paid tribute to him today at a news conference held in the Regina apostolorum Pontifical University in Rome - Mons. Josef Clemens, who was Cardinal Ratzinger's private secretary for 20 years, and current Secretary-General of the Congregation for the Laity; and Princess Alessandra Borghese, who presented her book "Sulla tracce di Joseph Ratzinger" (In the footsteps of Joseph Ratzinger).

The two spoke about the Pope they know to an audience that included Priests of the Legionaries of Christ, students and professors of Regina Apostolorum ,as well as the European University of Rome. They were introduced by the university rector, Father Pedro Barrajon, LC.

Mons. Clemens spoke about the Pope from the doctrinal and magisterial point of view; Borghese, from a very human viewpoint.

Mons. Clemens noted that the Pprp's birthday came not too long after the recent 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, and proceded to review the thoughts of Joseph Ratzinger on Europe and its Christian roots.

"Ratzinger has written almost 20 major essays and speeches on this theme in the past 30 years, first as Cardinal, then as Pope" he pointed out. "His thought about Europe is based on the fact that Europe is a cultural and historical concept rather than a geographical expression."

Quoting from several documents and speeches by Ratzinger, Clemens pointed out that he recognizes the common affinity between secular Enlightenment and Christianity in basic principles such as separation of Church and State, freedom of thought and the protection of human rights.

At the same time, hwoever, since the late 19th century, there has been a growing concept of reason and secularism which diminishes the significance of religion and would relegate it simply to the private sphere. Ratzinger, says Clemens, calls this reasoning 'anti-European' or 'post-European.'

"So Europe today," he contineud, "claims to recognize rights that are based only on reason, as the secularists define it - this is a criterion that carries the risk of anarchy. A multi-cultural Europe that wishes to enlarge itself by including Turkey is on this wavelength, although it is also a Godless Europe that Islam rejects and looks down upon."

"The idea of a united Europe," Clemens said, "was born after the Second World War as a seal of reconciliation and economic wellbeing by a group of Catholic Euorpean leaders who were also well-anchored in secularity and reason."

"But today, there is an obstinate resistance to accepting European history in the name of a multculturalism which is making Europe escape its identity, a refusal that is symptomatic of pathological self-hate, which hass the extreme consequence of mistrust in the future and in the utility of procreation."

"On the othe hand, the rebirth of Islam is not due to economic growth but to the spiritual bases that their culture still offers.

"We find ourselves in an economic community that levels out the spirit and measures thought, and this has resulted in the failure of European policies with respect to the developing countries, where it has been helping to spread purely materialistic thinking, and so ,paradoxically, our so-called civilization has only brought on new scourges like drugs and terrorism."

Speaking about her new book, which traces teh childhood and youth of Joseph Ratzinger in the places where he lived, Alessandra Borghese described the Ratzinger family as ahving been "very devout and united, even in difficult times as it was under Nazism, with the consequence that both sons became priests."

The portrait that emerges from her book, she says, "is a man strongly attached to his own land, to Bavaria, a region characterized by profound popular devotion and where Catholic rites are still lived through with great enthusiasm."

"Benedict XVI is a Pope whose popualrity is growing," she noted. "We see that in the great number of people coming to hear him, the impressive attendance at his audiences. Yet they are also struck by the elegance of his manners and his gentless of heart."

"He is a very courteous person," she says, "and never fails to express thanks to everyone he meets. I like to call him the Pope of Love - after all, love is the theme of his encyclical, Deus caritas est.

In conclusion, Borgehse noted: "The Pope believes strongly in Italy. At the national convention of the Italian Chruch in Verona last October, he gave very clear directives: ours is the land from which re-evangelization of the world should begin, and this will be possible if we do it with love."

Here's another item from Lella's blog today.

An unexpected portrait of Benedict -
and a challenge to his colleagues



ROME, April 19, (ASCA) - From the Regensburg 'incident' to DICO, from his calls for consistency in action by Catholic politicians to the unexpected topic of love in his papacy's programmmatic encyclical, the Italian press has dedicated many screaming headlines to Pope Benedict XVI.

But this morning, at the Associazione Stampa Roma (Rome Press Club), the presentation of the book "Ratzinger: Benedetto XVI e le conseguenze dell'amore" (Benedict XVI and the consequences of love) by ASCA's Vatican correspondent Carlo Di Cicco, posed this question to journalists: Have you considered how you have tailored your reporting in political terms about a theologian Pope whose focus is on his Magisterium and the spiritual care of his flock, and not on the Italian political agenda?

"Joseph Ratzinger is putting journalists to a gruelling test," he writes in the book. "Without intending to, he has forced them into a series of reporting challenges. Let us hope that this leads to a professionall self-examination in this respect, because to err is human but to persist in error is diabolical."

It was a challenge itself from Di Cicco, who took part in a round-table debate on the issue with other journalists and Gian Maria Vian, professor of philology at la Sapeinza Unvieersity in Rome (himself a frequent contributor to magazines).

Franco Siddi, president of the national federation of Italian press clubs, said: "Di Cicco, a conscientious Vatican reporter, does not take anything for granted. From his book emerges a Ratzinger that is very different from the stereotypes and cliches taken for granted and spouted at will by commentators."

This different profile, said Siddi, comes with "an ambitious challenge to the secular world to recognize an ethic that is shared by both believers and non-believers."

Di Cicco's book was presented as part of the Rome Press Club's "Book of the Month' series. He proposes a reading of the two years of Benedict's Pontificate so far in the context of his encyclical Deus caritas est

He notes how it was universally welcomed with great wonder because he was the first Pope in history to have confronted the the question of eros and agape and to have reconciled them in the Christian doctrine.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 2.46]

The Vatican Press Office released this today:

PASTORAL VISIT OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO VIGEVANO AND PAVIA, APRIL 21-22, 2007



PROGRAM

Saturday, April 21

15.30 Leave Rome-Ciampino for Milan-Linate airport.

16.30 Arrive at Milan-Linate airport.
Transfer to helicopter for flight to Vigevano.

16.50 Arrive at Dante Merlo stadium in Vigevano.
Transfer to Popemobile to go to Piazza Ducale.

17.10 Arrive at Piazza Ducale

17.15 Greeting to youth and sick people
from the central balcony of the Bishop's Palace.

17.30 EUCHARISTIC CONCELEBRATION at the Piazza Ducale.
- Homily by the Holy Father.

19.15 Transfer by car to Dante Merlo stadium.

19.45 Depart by helicopter for Pavia.

20.00 Arrive at Fortunati stadium in Pavia.
Travel by car to Piazza Duomo.

20.15 Arrive in Piazza Duomo.
Greeting to diocesan youth.

20.30 Arrive at the Bishop's palace in Pavia.
[Right next to Cathedral. The Pope is staying here overnight]


Sunday, April 22

08.45 Travel by car from Bishop's Palace to S. Matteo Polyclinic.

09.00 MEETING WITH OFFICIALS, MEDICAL STAFF, PATIENTS AND THEIR FAMILIES
in the interior courtyard.
- Address by the Holy Father.

09.45 Travel by car to the Borromeo Gardens.

10.30 EUCHARISTIC CONCELEBRATION at the Gardens.
- Homily by the Holy Father.

12:00 Recital of REGINA CAELI
- Words by the Holy Father

12.30 Travel by car from Borromeo Gardens to the Bishop's Palace

13.00 Lunch with the bishops of Lombardy at the Bishop's Palace

16.00 Travel by car to the University of Pavia.

16.15 MEETING WITH CULTURAL REPRESENTATIVES,
Teresiano courtyard of the University.
- Address of the Holy Father

17.00 Travel by car from the University to
the Basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro

17.15 Arrive at the Basilica.

17.30 CELEBRATION OF VESPERS WITH PRIESTS, RELIGIOUS
AND SEMINARIANS OF THE DIOCESE at the Basilica
- Homily by the Holy Father.

18.30 Travel by car from the Basilica to P. Fortunati stadium.

18.45 Leave by helicopter for Milan-Linate airport.

19.00 Arrive at Milan-Linate.
Immediate transfer to airplane for flight to Rome-Ciampino.

19.50 Arrive in Ciampino airport.
Travel by car to the Vatican.

20.15 Arrive at the Vatican.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 15.36]

The Vatican correspondent for Il Giornale, Andrea Tornielli, who wrote the first biography of Benedict XVI to come out in Italian shortly after the Conclave, writes today about that dreadfuly uninformed and biased article Newsweek published as an assessment of Benedict's Papacy after two years. Here is a translation.


The only good Pope
is a dead Pope, so it seems
By Andrea Tornielli


Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Vatican Secretary of State, was right when he said earlier this week, in his direct and therefore hardly Curial style, that "for today's secularists - but alas, even for some Catholics - it seems that the only good Pope is one who is no longer alive."

That was Bertone's reply to a question from Avvenire about the constant comparison made in the media between John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

On the second anniversary of Benedict's papacy yesterday, the magazine Newsweek came out with a made-up article critical of Papa Ratzinger, accusing him of being an 'invisible Pope' absent in every place where his presence is needed.

The article recalls with some nostalgia that John Paul II, in the first 100 days of his reign, already demonstrated his globe-trotting intentions by visiting Mexico, whereas his successor "has rarely left home."

Let's leave aside the very easy objection about the age difference (Wjotyla was 58 when elected, Ratzinger 78) and let's pretend not to know that the new Pope - now 80 - has actually travelled to Germany twice, once to Poland, Spain and Turkey, and is about to visit Brazil.

Because it is interesting to examine the Newsweek article's fundamental objection. Which is that Benedict XVI is supposedly interested only in reviving European Catholicism, which is afflicted by secularization and relativism, and that he has only been interested in fighting abortion, euthanasia, the legalization of gay marriages, etc.

At the same time, he is accused of having no interest at all in the major emergencies that confront the Catholic Church, like the expansion of Protestant sects in Latin America, which is said to be drawing away 8,000 Catholics daily from the flock fo Rome.

"He ignores us completely," the magazine quotes the Mexican sociologst Roberto Blancarte, a specialist in religious studies.

The coup de grace is about the Pope's expected liberalization of the mass of Pius V - as an act of liberalization, in line with what Wojtyla had begin, this should please the liberals, -but No, Newsweek disapproves, saying this would be a 'step backward' that would betray the memory of Paul VI, the Pope of conciliar reforms.

Above all, the source quoted for all these criticism is surprising. Blancarte is an anti-clerical sociologist who was the author of very virulent attacks against John Paul II, against his "Rome-centrism" which supposedly made him incapable of understanding the ferments in Latin America in wishing to restore his program of medieval restoration.

He's not the only case. Many of those who now lament John Paul II and exalt his greatness in order to criticize the 'invisibility' or the 'consevratism' of his successor wrote some of the most critical pieces about Papa Wojtyla - against his 'insistent presence' on the world scene, against his pro-activeness which allegedly reduced the importance of local churches and made the Church equivalent to the Pope, for 'stalling' the ecumenical dialog through the global super-presence of the "Super-Bishop of Rome."

The same journalists railed openly against the 'too-frequent" travels of 'God's globetrotter', against the great assembly-celebrations, against a style that was so different from the lamented Paul VI, true modern Pontiff and architect of great openings to modern society. [Conveniently forgetting his much-maligned encyclical against contraception!]

But as I recall, they were the very same critics who compared Papa Montini unfavorably to his blessed predecessor, the "good Pope John XXIII". The latter had opened so many hopes, which Paul VI (the gravedigger of Conciliar reforms, according to a noted historical school of thought that considers Vatican-II as a complete break with the past) had failed to follow through!

In short, it does seem that for some observers, the only good Pope is the one who is no longer around.

Il Giornale, 20 aprile 2007

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

So much for journalistic objectivity, not to mention common sense and consistency!

Vian analyzes Ratzinger,
but may be named to head
Osservatore Romano
By Paolo Rodari


"Simplification, decentralization, service and exemplarity. In the wake of Vatican-II but not separated from tradition nor from the Montini reforms, thse seem to be the guidelines for the transformation which Benedict XVI wishes to make in the Curia and on the papacy - simplifying, decentralizing, giving proper value to the competence of Vatican organisms (coordinated effectively but not replaced bythe Secretariat of State), promoting a renewed communion between Rome and the local
churches.

"Thanks to a method of confronting problems and to collegiality, as in the January 2007 Curial meeting on China. A method to which Joseph Ratzinger - as theologian, as bishop, as Curial cardinal - has remained faithful. In order not to lose sight of the essential, and in the service of truth, without ever placing anything ahead of Christ."

These are the words used (in the first issue for 2007 of the journal Vita e Pensiero) by Church historian and professor of patristic philology at La Sapienza University in Rome, Gian Maria Vian, to describe the first two years of Benedict XVI's Papacy.

Two years in which, according to Vian, the Pope has worked on "remodelling papal governance...in the name of simplification and a return to the basics."

Especially , he adds, since it is difficult to hypothesize when a true overalll reform of the Curia will take place. Sixtus VI did not do it until the third year of his reign, Pius X and Paul VI in the fifth year, and John Paul II in the 10th year!

In fact, in the coming months, if it is true that the Pope will be making a number of Curial nominations, it is very likely that most of them will be second-ranking positions within these internal church 'ministries' , namely the secretaries and sub-secretaries, those who most closely support the work of the prefects of congregations and presidents of the pontifical councils.

And yet, besides all these, a nomination for a conspicuous and very prestigious post may directly concern Vian himself, who is said to be the leading candidate to replace the outgoing editor of the Vatican official organ, L'Osservatore Romano, Mario Agnes, who has been there since 1982.

If this happens, the Vatican newspaper will not only be getting an excellent scholar whose work Ratzinger personally admires, but also someone capable of putting on paper, 'as it should', the thinking of the Catholic Church.

Vian has been doing that all these years in articles written for Avvenire, which has a stable of fine writers, but Vian has always been among the most lucid and competent. More importantly, he is well in line and up-to-date with the Church's positions on family issues.

Indeed, Vian was one of the signatories - before the bishops' pastoral note on DICO came out - of an open letter by various Catholic intellectuals urging the bishops to "firmly make clear their formulation of doctrine and moral culture as regards any legislation affecting the family."

Paul VI told the Roman Curia in September 1963 that their function was "to be the custodian or echo of divine truth and to express this in language and dialog appropriate to human understanding" and then "to listen and interpret the words of the Pope, while not omitting to provide him with every useful and objective infiormation".

Vian's appointment would meet those communication requirements. Because to inform the world of Papal events and messages requires competence and knowledge of Church history. One cannot inform unless one knows exactly the entity one is reporting on, including its history.

A scholar who lives with this and nourishes himself daily with such knowledge cannot be amiss.

If the choice of Vian is confirmed, then Ratzinger will confirm the trend not to entrust the direction of the Vatican newspaper to a professional journalist. This would square with the Pope's own style - more reflective and interested in communicating content, rather than being concerned directly with the world of mass media.

Il Riformista, 19 aprile 2007

The second anniversary of the Benedictine Pontificate was decidedly low-key compared to the first anniversary in 2006, and that's understandable. First anniversaries are always 'more' significant. But one also must consider the great play given to his 80th birthday celebrations earlier this week and the great excitement that greeted his book JESUS OF NAZARETH. Not to mention that he had no public activities yesterday. I can imagine the Pope saying, "Let's keep the spotlights away if we can!"

For a change, Lella gives us this article taken from a northern Italian newspaper, Il Giornale di Vicenza, rather than one of tne national newspapers. Vicenza is a city north of Venice which is best known for several buildings designed by the great Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio. I place this ahead because it is also a news item, wehreas the cardinal's assessment is given during an magazine interview.


Two years of Papa Ratzinger;
tomorrow, he visits Lombardy
By Andrea Bertin


VATICAN CITY - The second anniversary of his election to the Papacy was certainly in minor tone for Benedict XVI - perhaps because of the occurrence of his 80th birthday a few days earlier and the release at the same time of his new book on Jesus Christ.

Therefore, complete silence from the Vatican Press Office and other Vatican sources. [Not complete silence - The Press Office did release the attendance figures for April 2006-April 19 2007 yesterday.] But Vatican Radio and Osservatore Romano took due note of the anniversary.

And in the evening, at Teatro Argentina, in the center of Rome, there was a celebration called Vangeli e Giovani (Gospels and youth), organized by the Diocese of Rome to mark the second anniversary, at which the guest of honor was Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Secretary of State.

Papa Ratzinger's 'right hand man' reiterated to the crowd the great outpouring of tributes from around the world for the Pope, not only for his birthday but for the second anniversary. And not only for his life, but also for his style of governing.

Of course, yesterday simply marked an apparent pause, as behind Vatican walls, preparations were being finalized for the Pope's appointments this weekend.

On Saturday and Sunday, the Pope will be making a pastoral visit to Vigevano and Pavia. The latter was visited by Pope John Paul II 23 years ago, but Vigevano has never been visited by a Pope since 1418, when Martin V stopped there briefly.

Among the many appointments this weekend, Pope Benedict will be visiting the Basilica which keeps the urn with the remains of St. Augustine. These arrived in Pavia several centuries after his death in Hippo, northern Africa, via Sardinia.

Papa Ratzinger is a great admirer of Augustine, who was the subject of his doctoral thesis. Speaking to Roman seminarians last February 17, he praised Augustine's work as a theologian, preacher, bishop and man of the Church.

On Tuesday, April 24, the Pope will be meeting with Abu Mazen, president of the Palestinian Authority.

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

Here, on the other hand, is an assessment of the Benedictine papacy so far by one of his close collaborators in the Curia, from the April 2007 issue of INSIDE THE VATICAN. The interviewer, Wlodzimierz Redzioch, is a Polish journalist who lives and works in Rome.


The First Two Years:
A conversation about Benedict
and his pontificate
with Cardinal Paul Poupard

By Wlodzimierz Redzioch


Pope Benedict XVI was elected two years ago on April 19, 2005, and installed as Pope two years ago on April 24, 2005, so we thought it appropriate to reflect now, in April 2007, on these first two years of Benedict's pontificate with one of his closest advisors, Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Culture.


Your Eminence, the second anniversary of Pope Benedict XVI’s election on April 19, 2005, is drawing near. I would like to recall that day two years ago. Cardinal Julian Herranz has said that the cardinals sitting in conclave chose Joseph Ratzinger because he is the Church’s greatest theologian in addition to being a pious man, and that his election was regarded as a sign of continuity with his great predecessor’s pontificate. Do you agree with this?
These remarks are an a posteriori justification, interesting though they may be. The conclave is not an electoral machine, but a congregation of men praying and listening to God. In truth, the Pope is not elected by the cardinals, but by God; inspired by the Holy Ghost, the conclave must identify the one He has chosen with prudence and understanding.

What, in your opinion, were the goals Benedict XVI set himself when he started his pontificate? How many have been achieved?
Benedict XVI intends to return to the basics, to interiorization, to the essence of the Christian life, the relation to Jesus. This direction featured strongly in his first Exhortation following the Synod of Bishops on the Eucharist, Sacramentum Caritatis.

On his election Benedict XVI indicated the proclamation of the Word of God and the Church’s missionary vocation as primary concerns to which every single believer and the communion of believers as disciples of Christ must bear witness.

The Pope also desires to see the application of the Second Vatican Council in all sectors of the Church’s life, including the liturgy, the promotion of the unity of Christians, and in intercultural and interreligious dialogue. It is unreasonable to ask whether a Pope has achieved in just two years the goals he set for the whole of his pontificate.

Can we outline Benedict XVI’s style as early as two years after his election?
Benedict XVI’s style is "essential." It is, in itself, an exhortation to every Christian and to each man and woman of goodwill to live as a human person to the fullness, that is, as a person open to God the Father, who turns all of us into His children.

Openness to the transcendent and to our neighbor are the two dimensions of Christian love that the Pope treated magisterially in his first encyclical Deus Caritas Est.

The same holds true of the government of the universal Church: Benedict XVI reserves the faculty to deal with tasks he regards as essential to his ministry as Peter’s successor, entrusting his collaborators with those matters that do not require his personal intervention. He considers his mission as teacher of the Christian Faith to be of the greatest importance. It is enough to read or listen to any of his interventions to perceive the long studies and deep grounding underlying them.

A mirror of his personality and style, Benedict XVI’s speeches reach the highest intellectual level without ever using a word that someone may not understand. The ability to express the mystery of God in clear and simple language is an appropriate definition of Benedict XVI’s style.

All over the world, public opinion regards Benedict XVI’s conference at the University of Regensburg, along with the violent and irreverent reaction it raised, as the most sensational episode of his pontificate. What conclusions must be drawn from the Regensburg case?
It is now acknowledged that many did not read the Holy Father’s talk from beginning to end. It was manipulated to provoke a deplorable controversy in the media, misusing quotations out of context. Nevertheless, even negative episodes can have a happy ending.

I was amazed by the Muslim world’s reaction. Thinkers, intellectuals, representatives of various Islamic currents criticized the Pope, sometimes very harshly, but they did not leave the occasion to the naive and violent extremists.

Instead, for example, 38 personalities, including university professors and religious representatives, enjoined a debate, signing a letter to the Holy Father. I also received letters from scientists, believers and intellectuals declaring their intention to encourage an exchange of opinions on the faith-reason relation.

This confirms that the question raised by Pope Benedict XVI is really of great relevance today. It is a sign of hope and a response to the Holy Father’s speech.

I do not need to recite again here the clarifications that followed the Regensburg conference at different levels of the Holy See, the reception of ambassadors of countries with a Muslim majority, the message I sent to all Muslims at the end of Ramadan, and many other initiatives.

In my opinion, the Pope’s journey to Turkey put an end to this controversy in many respects. He sent out a message of peace and friendship to the Turkish people, but his speeches, his meetings, the simplicity of his gestures such as the visit to the Blue Mosque, went beyond the Regensburg talk, laying the foundations for what really matters: a dialogue between brothers as religious believers.

At the beginning of his pontificate, Benedict XVI expressed his wish to work for the progress of ecumenism. Where are we now with ecumenical dialogue?
Whereas interreligious dialogue treats of dialogue with followers of other religions, ecumenical dialogue is about the relations between Christians, and, as you know, there is another dicastery of the Holy See dedicated to this sphere, so it is not up to me to discuss this point. But I am glad to see that many barriers to ecumenical dialogue have been brought down through cultural cooperation.

As everybody knows, many schisms between the followers of Christ are due to historical and cultural circumstances, rather than dogmatic issues. So by improving cultural relations we seek to facilitate the creation of an atmosphere of understanding, fraternity and mutual awareness in which the details of the problems which are still a hindrance to the complete unity of Christians can be more effectively addressed.

At the same time, this commitment to intercultural dialogue permits us to cooperate with our separated brethren in the promotion of the common good and in the much-needed evangelization of contemporary secularized cultures.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger said it was necessary to simplify the organization of the Curia, which he said had become too complex in the last 30 years. Nevertheless, apart from minor changes (e.g., the assignation to a single presidency of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and the Pontifical Council for Culture), Benedict XVI has not yet reorganized the Curia. Why has he not yet achieved this?
I would not speak so much of an unachieved reorganization, but of a planned and phased reorganization.

Two different currents of concern have manifested themselves since the Second Vatican Council: one assumes that the Church must reveal her desire to be close to contemporary men and women by sharing their problems, hence the creation of various new bodies of the Curia such as the Pontifical Councils; another current, following the doctrine of the Second Vatican Council, tends to emphasize the importance of local Churches, hence the recognition of the competency of local bishops to deal with matters which were once the prerogative of the Holy See.

Now, after so many years and so many changes, it is possible to take a critical approach to the working of the Roman Curia. It is a complex organization and in reorganizing it, the Holy Father must take into account the innumerable consequences which even a limited change may produce. The Pope, with his closest collaborators, will do his best to find out what the Church needs most today.

You have been working in the Curia for many years. How do you think it works? Is it really efficient in its cooperation with the Pope?
The good work done by the Curia is clear for all to see: the Holy Father could not exercise his ministry in service of the universal Church and local Churches without his collaborators.

The Curia helps the Pope. Like all human organizations it could be better, but its imperfections do not entitle us to ignore the enormous amount of work done in its offices by a staff made up of people from all over the world who bring with them, not only their competence, but also the richness of their different cultures.

Many experts on Vatican affairs keep saying that nothing has happened in the Curia for some time. Is this a wrong consideration?
It is not up to the Curia to seek media coverage. As I said before, the Curia cooperates with the Pope in the government of the universal Church and most of its operations are not accompanied by press releases.

Let us now come to the issues directly concerning the Councils over which you preside. Benedict XVI often refers to the dangers of relativism, especially in Europe. How is dialogue possible with those who, unlike the Church, regard the relativism of values, lifestyles, etc., as the basis of democracy?
Pope Benedict XVI is a precious gift to the Church and the world. He is a man of great depth who knows our world very well. He never tires of diagnosing its diseases, even the most difficult to detect. Like a good and intelligent doctor he proposes the correct, though sometimes painful, medicines.

He has often condemned relativism, defining it as a "new religion." With a certain sense of humor he has also coined the phrase "self-made religion."

As regards your question, I must first make it clear that the Pope himself always tries to dialogue with the world, proposing ideas and values consistent with faith and reason, two gifts of God that should go hand-in-hand. A confused world, deprived of any reference to faith and reason, needs a guiding light to help it discern and unmask the false values underlying certain ideologies.

The identification of relativism as the basis of democracy implies a risk of anarchy and the negation of mankind’s ultimate nature. Pluralism, i.e., the acceptance of different opinions with which we must dialogue on the basis of respect, sincerity and attention, accepting one another as human beings, is one thing; permitting under the name of pluralism attitudes that depersonalize man is quite another thing.

Religion is not about politics. It is about the Truth revealed. We must question ourselves more carefully about human nature and consider these reflections, which can only help a confused world.

Dialogue with other religions must follow the Church’s guidelines in order to preserve the integrity of the Catholic Faith. The Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue pursues the task, entrusted to it by the Holy Father, of encouraging fruitful and positive relations with believers of other religions in the spirit of the Gospel and the Church and papal teaching. It avails itself of the aid of its members and consultors. Its cooperation with other dicasteries of the Roman Curia, above all the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, makes a significant contribution to confronting the challenge of relativism.

What are the biggest challenges the Church is faced with today?
The Church must propose herself as a real "house of holiness" open to dialogue with others. This is the only way for the Church to become a leaven for our society and a sign of hope for modern man.

In today’s evermore de-Christianized society, religious indifference and practical atheism are spreading in all directions. The Church pursues dialogue and interreligous cooperation hoping that one day everybody and everything will be reconciled to Christ, the Lord of history for whom every heart longs. Interreligious dialogue is part of the Church’s evangelizing mission and of the challenges facing her in the third millennium.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 21/04/2007 21.04]

Finally, after a week's inactivity, a report from John Allen! I was getting worried...And he's adding his bit to the motu proprio fever, but with a twist. I did not realize there were 'anti-Jewish' prayers in the Old Missal! What I did assume was that the Mass readings and prayers prescribed for each day would be made identical in both rites, because there is, after all, only one liturgical calendar.

Hold your breath for the next media frenzy:
The Latin Mass document is coming
All Things Catholic
by John L. Allen, Jr.
Friday, Apr. 20, 2007


To the growing list of indications that something is imminent with regard to the long-awaited document from Pope Benedict XVI authorizing wider use of the pre-Vatican II Mass, I can add one item this week.

An April 3 letter from Cardinal Walter Kasper, who among other things heads the Vatican's Pontifical Commission for Religious Relations with Jews, responds to concerns from the International Council of Christians and Jews about the pre-Vatican II Mass, in light of controversial passages it contains regarding Judaism.

The last sentence of Kasper's letter, the text of which I have, is the key line: "While I do not know what the pope intends to state in his final text, it is clear that the decision that has been made cannot now be changed."

Kasper's language clearly indicates that something definitive has happened. It adds to the confirmation given by the Vatican's Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, on March 31 that a motu proprio from Benedict XVI, meaning a document under the pope's personal authority, on the pre-Vatican II Mass is coming.

Catholic publishers in Rome, anticipating the pope's decision, have already begun preparing new editions of the pre-Vatican II Mass books, called the "1962 Missal" because that was the last year prior to the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) in which an official liturgical book according to the old rite was issued.

Anyone who has ventured into the Catholic blogosphere recently is aware that speculation about the motu proprio has been at a fever pitch for months. One wag has even posted a list of the Top Ten signs that someone is in the grip of "motu-mania," including: "You have a calendar with all the likely feast days that the motu proprio might be issued marked," and, "You have written 500 blog posts, and 480 of them have been about the motu proprio."

In part, the frenzy has been stoked by a series of over-anxious news reports containing rumored release dates. A partial list includes October 2006, March 2007 (in conjunction with the pope's exhortation for the Synod on the Eucharist), Holy Thursday, and this past April 16 (Benedict's 80th birthday). The hot tip now is April 30, the feast of St. Pius V on the Roman calendar, or May 5, the feast of Pius V on the older calendar.

At the risk of raining on the "motu-mania" parade, however, it's worth noting that many experts believe this breathless anticipation will, in the long run, seem excessive in terms of the document's real-world impact.

For one thing, more than 40 years after the council, many priests are unfamiliar with the pre-Vatican II rite and may not rush to celebrate it even if authorized to do so - if not for theological reasons, simply because they're already stretched too thin.

For another, it's not clear how much pent-up demand for the pre-Vatican II Mass actually exists. Many Catholics enthusiastic for the old Mass already have access to it, in parishes and religious orders who celebrate the old Mass under the terms of a 1984 indult from the Vatican.

Most bishops, pastors and liturgical experts whom I've polled believe that with or without the motu proprio, the normal liturgical experience for the overwhelming majority of Catholics will continue to be the post-Vatican II Mass in the vernacular language.

Estimates vary, but many say that they expect no more than one or two percent of Catholics worldwide to routinely attend the pre-Vatican II rite, even if they were given ready access to it.

As one American bishop put it to me, "We wouldn't have spent the last decade sweating blood over a new English translation of the Mass if we didn't think this was going to be the normal liturgical experience for most of our people."

Further, the motu proprio is unlikely to do much, at least in the short term, to end the break between Rome and the followers of the late French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. The traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, founded by Lefebvre, claims roughly one million adherents worldwide, and trying to heal this rupture has been a top priority of both John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

Anyone who knows the leadership of the Society of St. Pius X realizes that the older Mass is merely one element of more sweeping reservations about the council. Above all, many traditionalists object to the council's teaching on religious freedom, ecumenism and inter-religious relations.

Bishop Bernard Fellay, head of the Society of St. Pius X, has stated that he wants the pope to acknowledge a formal "right of dissent" from the teaching of Vatican II on these points. By itself, the motu proprio will not solve these problems.

In other words, the motu proprio may end up as a classic instance of one of those Vatican documents that unleashes a torrent of debate and commentary, but changes relatively little on the ground.

Be that as it may, there's no doubt the motu proprio will be a media sensation, because the older Mass has become the most potent symbol of tensions over the basic direction of the Catholic Church in the period since the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).

In the court of broad public opinion, expanded access to the pre-Vatican II rite will be interpreted as a victory for the church's traditionalist wing, however the Vatican explains it.

Among the debates certain to swirl is a set of concerns regarding Jewish-Christian relations. The exchange between Kasper and the International Council of Christians and Jews, based in Germany, illustrates what's at stake.

Servite Fr. John Pawlikowski, an American, wrote to Kasper on March 29 on behalf of the executive body of the International Council of Christians and Jews. Pawlikowski, an expert in Catholic/Jewish relations at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, told Kasper that although the phrase "perfidious Jews" was lifted from the pre-Vatican II Mass by Pope John XXIII, the older Mass still contains other prayers for Jews, Muslims and other Christians that Pawlikowski called "profoundly demeaning."

"The expanded validation of such prayers," Pawikowski argued, "will rightly challenge Catholic integrity in terms of the proclamations of the last four decades," meaning advances in ecumenical and inter-faith relations, especially with Jews.

Pawlikowski's letter does not specify which prayers in the 1962 Missal his group finds objectionable. A Web site sponsored by the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding at Boston College, however, offers a background document on the older Mass, along with a critical statement from a "Jews and Christians" group of the Central Committee of German Catholics. The two texts cite concerns widely voiced by experts in Catholic-Jewish relations.

For example, the Good Friday Mass contains a prayer "For the conversion of the Jews," which reads: "Let us pray also for the Jews, that the Lord our God may take the veil from their hearts and that they also may acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ. … Almighty and everlasting God, You do not refuse Your mercy even to the Jews; hear the prayers which we offer for the blindness of that people so that they may acknowledge the light of Your truth, which is Christ, and be delivered from their darkness."

The background document on the Boston College site asserts that the prayer is problematic.

"The references to 'even the Jews,' 'their darkness,' and 'blindness' and for their conversion runs counter to the respect for ongoing Jewish covenantal life throughout historic time that was expressed in Nostra Aetate, 4," it says, referring to the Vatican II document on Judaism and other religions. "Similar problems might be found elsewhere in the Missal simply because it was uninformed by subsequent developments in Catholic understanding."

The document from the German group highlights other objections.

"The pre-conciliar Roman Missal is inseparably connected to the old lectionary," it states. "In its sequence of about 60 diverse formularies for the celebration of Mass for Sundays and holy days, there is no reading from the Old Testament for each Sunday, except in only three cases … This is blatant Marcionism, which devalues the first part of the two-part Christian Bible - namely the Bible of Israel - to insignificance."

The German group also questions the underlying worldview of the old Mass.

"Its theology and spirituality … contradicts much that was theologically central to the Second Vatican Council," it says. "This concerns, not least, the unique relationship between the Church and Judaism (see Lumen Gentium, 16 and Nostra Aetate, 4)."

These points, experts say, illustrate the reservations about the 1962 Missal at which Pawlikowski's letter hints.

In his brief reply, Kasper told Pawlikowski that he had already discussed such concerns with Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, head of the Vatican's Ecclesia Dei Commission which oversees use of the older Mass. Castrillon is a driving force behind the new motu proprio.

Kasper writes that he expressed the concerns of "many people engaged in the Jewish-Christian dialogue" to Castrillon.

"After a long conversation, it was reiterated that the use of the Missal does not represent principally a new situation," Kasper writes, "insofar as its use has been permitted over time in particular cases."

Kasper said he's not entirely sure what might be done about sensitive passages regarding Jews.

"The 1962 Missal does not have the term 'perfidious Jews.' I was unable to obtain a clear answer," Kasper writes, "with regard to the prayer for the Jews."

Kasper then closes with the sentence quoted above about the pope's decision no longer being open to debate.

Whatever form Benedict's final decision takes, the kinds of controversies reflected in this exchange will continue - even if most Catholics, on most Sundays and in most parishes around the world, remain blissfully unaffected by them.

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

I checked my Missal, which was published in Valencia, Spain, in 1951 (I received it as my Confirmation gift) and sure enough, the Good Friday service includes a series of prayers after the reading of the Passion as told by St. John.

Prayers are said for the following, in this order: the Pope, the clergy and the religious, the Caudillo [Franco was leader of Spain at the time], the Spanish state, the catechumens, prisoners, sick people and wanderers, heretics and schismatics, all who are deceived by Satan, and then, yes! two back-to-back prayers for the Jews. Translated, they say -

First, "Let us also pray for the perfidious Jews, so that God may remove the veil that covers their hearts and they may recognize our Lord Jesus Christ".

Then, "Almighty and Eternal God, do not exclude from Your mercy the perfidious Jews, listen to our prayers that we address to You for their blindness, so that recognizing the light of your truth in Jesus Christ, they may emerge from the shadows, through the same Christ our Lord, Amen."

So those were the prayers that were taken out in 1962! And now I realize why I never saw them. There is no Mass on Good Friday, and our Good Friday devotions were confined to hearing sermons on the Seven Last Words of Christ from noon till 3 p.m. (the hour of His death on the Cross), followed then by a procession called "Santo Entierro" (Holy Burial), in which a greater than lifesize figure of Jesus lies within a glass enclosed catafalque on wheels, preceded by statues of most of the Biblical holy figures associated with the Passion and death of the Lord.

About the complaint that the Old Missal does not quote the Old Testament enough, that is simply wrong. The Psalms are all over the place, day in and day out, as well as the prophets and the first books of the Old Testmament, etc.

I opened my missal to the variable parts of the Mass at random, and came on the Mass of St. Mark the Evangelist said on April 25. The Introit (which opens the Mass, and is always a Psalm) is Psalm 63, the Epistle is from Ezekiel, the Alleluia verses are from Ps. 88 and Ps. 20, the Gospel is according to St. Luke (strangely enough, when we are celebrating St. Mark); the Offertory prayer is again from Psalm 88, and the Communion prayer is from Ps. 63.
(Total - 5 OT, 1 NT).

I went and compared it with what's in the Novus Ordo for the same day: the Reading from Peter's first letter; the Responsorial Psalm from Ps 89, and the Gospel from St. Mark. (Total - 2 NT, 1 OT)

Just in this one Mass, we can see how the Old Missal uses much more of the Old Testament, if only because it has so many more variable parts!

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 20.09]

We read about this last year. Now, it's finally official.

Vatican commission:
Limbo reflects 'restrictive view of salvation'
By John Thavis
Catholic News Service



VATICAN CITY, a[PRIL 20 (CNS) -- After several years of study, the Vatican's International Theological Commission said there are good reasons to hope that babies who die without being baptized go to heaven.

In a document published April 20, the commission said the traditional concept of limbo - as a place where unbaptized infants spend eternity but without communion with God - seemed to reflect an "unduly restrictive view of salvation."

The church continues to teach that, because of original sin, baptism is the ordinary way of salvation for all people and urges parents to baptize infants, the document said.

But there is greater theological awareness today that God is merciful and "wants all human beings to be saved," it said. Grace has priority over sin, and the exclusion of innocent babies from heaven does not seem to reflect Christ's special love for "the little ones," it said.

"Our conclusion is that the many factors that we have considered ... give serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptized infants who die will be saved and enjoy the beatific vision," the document said.

"We emphasize that these are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge," it added.

The 41-page document, titled "The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized," was published in Origins, the documentary service of Catholic News Service. Pope Benedict XVI authorized its publication earlier this year.

The 30-member International Theological Commission acts as an advisory panel to the Vatican, in particular to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Its documents are not considered expressions of authoritative church teaching, but they sometimes set the stage for official Vatican pronouncements.

The commission's document said salvation for unbaptized babies who die was becoming an urgent pastoral question, in part because their number is greatly increasing. Many infants today are born to parents who are not practicing Catholics, and many others are the unborn victims of abortion, it said.

Limbo has never been defined as church dogma and is not mentioned in the current Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states simply that unbaptized infants are entrusted to God's mercy.

But limbo has long been regarded as the common teaching of the church. In the modern age, "people find it increasingly difficult to accept that God is just and merciful if he excludes infants, who have no personal sins, from eternal happiness," the new document said.

Parents in particular can experience grief and feelings of guilt when they doubt their unbaptized children are with God, it said.

The church's hope for these infants' salvation reflects a growing awareness of God's mercy, the commission said. But the issue is not simple, because appreciation for divine mercy must be reconciled with fundamental church teachings about original sin and about the necessity of baptism for salvation, it said.

The document traced the development of church thinking about the fate of unbaptized children, noting that there is "no explicit answer" from Scripture or tradition.

In the fifth century, St. Augustine concluded that infants who die without baptism were consigned to hell. By the 13th century, theologians referred to the "limbo of infants" as a place where unbaptized babies were deprived of the vision of God, but did not suffer because they did not know what they were deprived of.

Through the centuries, popes and church councils were careful not to define limbo as a doctrine of the faith and to leave the question open. That was important in allowing an evolution of the teaching, the theological commission said.

A key question taken up by the document was the church's teaching that baptism is necessary for salvation. That teaching needs interpretation, in view of the fact that "infants ... do not place any personal obstacle in the way of redemptive grace," it said.

In this and other situations, the need for the sacrament of baptism is not absolute and is secondary to God's desire for the salvation of every person, it said.

"God can therefore give the grace of baptism without the sacrament being conferred, and this fact should particularly be recalled when the conferring of baptism would be impossible," it said.

This does not deny that all salvation comes through Christ and in some way through the church, it said, but it requires a more careful understanding of how this may work.

The document outlined several ways by which unbaptized babies might be united to Christ:

- A "saving conformity to Christ in his own death" by infants who themselves suffer and die.

- A solidarity with Christ among infant victims of violence, born and unborn, who like the holy innocents killed by King Herod are endangered by the "fear or selfishness of others."

- God may simply give the gift of salvation to unbaptized infants, corresponding to his sacramental gift of salvation to the baptized.

The document said the standard teaching that there is "no salvation outside the church" calls for similar interpretation.

The church's magisterium has moved toward a more "nuanced understanding" of how a saving relationship with the church can be realized, it said. This does not mean that someone who has not received the sacrament of baptism cannot be saved, it said.

Rather, it means that "there is no salvation which is not from Christ and ecclesial by its very nature," it said.

The document quoted St. Paul's teaching that spouses of Christians may be "consecrated" through their wives or husbands. This indicates that the holiness of the church reaches people "outside the visible bounds of the church" through the bonds of human communion, it said.

The document said the church clearly teaches that people are born into a state of sinfulness -- original sin -- which requires an act of redemptive grace to be washed away.

But Scripture also proclaims the "superabundance" of grace over sin, it said. That seems to be missing in the idea of limbo, which identifies more with Adam's sinfulness than with Christ's redemption, it said.

"Christ's solidarity with all of humanity must have priority over the solidarity of human beings with Adam," it said.

Liturgically, the motive for hope was confirmed by the introduction in 1970 of a funeral rite for unbaptized infants whose parents intended to present them for baptism, it said.

The commission said the new theological approach to the question of unbaptized babies should not be used to "negate the necessity of baptism, nor to delay the conferral of the sacrament."

"Rather, there are reasons to hope that God will save these infants precisely because it was not possible to do for them that what would have been most desirable -- to baptize them in the faith of the church and incorporate them visibly into the body of Christ," it said.

The commission said hopefulness was not the same as certainty about the destiny of such infants.

"It must be clearly acknowledged that the church does not have sure knowledge about the salvation of unbaptized infants who die," it said.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, was president of the commission and head of the doctrinal congregation when the commission began studying the question of limbo in a systematic way in 2004.

U.S. Cardinal William J. Levada now heads the commission and the doctrinal congregation. Cardinal Levada met with the pope to discuss the document Jan. 19 and, with the pope's approval, authorized its publication.

- - -

Editor's Note: The document appears in Vol. 36, No. 45, of Origins: CNS Documentary Service. The single-copy price is $5.00 and can be ordered by calling (202) 541-3290. Origins Online subscribers can read the document by clicking here.



Pope revises 'limbo' for babies
By NICOLE WINFIELD



VATICAN CITY, April 20 (AP)- Pope Benedict XVI has revised traditional Roman Catholic teaching on so-called "limbo," approving a church report released Friday that said there was reason to hope that babies who die without baptism can go to heaven.

Benedict approved the findings of the International Theological Commission, which issued its long-awaited document on limbo on Origins, the documentary service of Catholic News Service, the news agency of the American Bishop's Conference.

"We can say we have many reasons to hope that there is salvation for these babies," the Rev. Luis Ladaria, a Jesuit who is the commission's secretary-general, told The Associated Press.

Although Catholics have long believed that children who die without being baptized are with original sin and thus excluded from heaven, the church has no formal doctrine on the matter. Theologians have long taught, however, that such children enjoy an eternal state of perfect natural happiness, a state commonly called limbo, but without being in communion with God.

Pope John Paul II and Benedict had urged further study on limbo, in part because of "the pressing pastoral needs" sparked by the increase in abortion and the growing number of children who die without being baptized, the report said.

In the document, the commission said there were "serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptized infants who die will be saved and brought into eternal happiness."

It stressed, however, that "these are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge."

Ladaria said no one could know for certain what becomes of unbaptized babies since Scripture is largely silent on the matter.

Catholic parents should still baptize their children, as that sacrament is the way salvation is revealed, the document said.

The International Theological Commission is a body of Vatican-appointed theologians who advise the pope and the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Benedict headed the Congregation for two decades before becoming pope in 2005.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/04/2007 21.23]

Pope urges Sri Lanka to respect rights
in island's conflict




VATICAN CITY, April 21(AFP) - Pope Benedict XVI has urged Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse to respect human rights when dealing with the country's bloody conflict, according to a statement from the Holy See.

During a 20-minute meeting, the pope "repeated the necessity of respecting human rights and reopening the path of dialogue and negotiation, which is the only way to end the bloody violence staining the island", it said.

Fighting between the army and separatist Tamil rebels has intensified since Rajapakse's election at the end of 2005, leaving more than 4,000 people dead.

The pope also underlined the Catholic church's commitment to the "delicate work of forming consciences" in Sri Lanka "with the sole aim of supporting the common good, reconciliation and peace", the statement said.

Presidential spokesman Lucien Rajakarunanayake told journalists that Rajapakse had highlighted the authorities' efforts to halt the fighting.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) wrote to Benedict XVI before Friday's talks asking him to stress to the president the importance of ending the violence.

The US-based campaign group also expressed concern for the fate of Jim Brown, a Catholic priest who went missing last August after being arrested at a navy checkpoint on the island of Kayts in northern Sri Lanka.

The north and northeast of the country are strongholds of the mainly-Hindu Tamil rebels, who are fighting for independence.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 21/04/2007 15.18]

PROGRAM FOR PASTORAL VISIT



Saturday, April 21
15.30 Leave Rome-Ciampino for Milan-Linate airport.
16.30 Arrive at Milan-Linate airport.
Transfer to helicopter for flight to Vigevano.
16.50 Arrive at Dante Merlo stadium in Vigevano.
Transfer to Popemobile to go to Piazza Ducale.
17.10 Arrive at Piazza Ducale
17.15 Greeting to youth and sick people
from the central balcony of the Bishop's Palace.


Altar for the Mass at Piazza Ducale.

17.30 EUCHARISTIC CONCELEBRATION at the Piazza Ducale.
- Homily by the Holy Father.
19.15 Transfer by car to Dante Merlo stadium.
19.45 Depart by helicopter for Pavia.

======================================================
PAVIA

20.00 Arrive at Fortunati stadium in Pavia.
Travel by car to Piazza Duomo.
20.15 Arrive in Piazza Duomo.
Greeting to diocesan youth.
20.30 Arrive at the Bishop's palace in Pavia.
[Right next to Cathedral. The Pope is staying here overnight]


By Marco Fabi
korazym.org

Pope Benedict XVI's visit is only the second time a Pope has come to Vigevano.

For the first time, one must go back to 1418 when Vigevano was just a small outlying quarter of the Duchy of Milan.

And even then, the Pope only stayed a few hours, long enough for prayers at the rural chapel of Santa Maria intus Vineas, and for some rest midway through a trip back to Rome from Germany.

The Pope was Martin V, and he was heading back to Rome after attending a Council in Cologne.

Those were not tranquil times for the Church in Rome. In Constance, the cardinals had deposed the anti-Pope John XXIII (yes!). The election of Martin V at a Conclave held on St. Martin's Day, with 23 cardinals adn 30 delegates taking part, put an end to the schism in the Western Church.

The new Pope then left Constance to return to Rome in May. After Vigevano, the Pope also stopped in Florence. He did not get back to Rome till 1420, where he sought to re-establish order and prosperity in the city.



PRIMER ON VIGEVANO (from Wikipedia):

Vigevano is a town and commune in the province of Pavia, Lombardy, northern Italy, which possesses many artistic treasures and runs a huge industrial business. It is at the center of a district called Lomellina, a great rice-growing agricultural centre.

It occupies an area of 87 square kms. and has a population of 60,000. It is located 35 kilometers southwest of Milan.

The earliest notices of Vigevano date from the 10th century AD, when it was a favoured residence of the Lombard king Arduin, for the sake of the good hunting in the vicinity.

Vigevano was a Ghibelline commune, favoring the Emperor and was accordingly besieged and taken by the Milanese in 1201 and again in 1275. In 1328 it finally surrendered to Azzone Visconti, and thereafter shared the political fortunes of Milan.

The Church of S. Pietro Martiere was built, with the adjacent Dominican convent, by Filippo Maria Visconti in 1445. In the last years of Visconti domination it sustained a siege by Francesco Sforza, himself a native of the city. Once he was settled in power in Lombardy, Sforza procured the erection of Vigevano as the seat of a bishop and provided its revenues.


Vigevano is crowned by the Castello Sforzesco, a stronghold rebuilt 1492-94 for Ludovico Maria Sforza (Ludovico il Moro), the great patron born in the town, who transformed the fortification of Luchino Visconti (who in turn had re-used a Lombard fortress) into a rich noble residence, at the cusp of Gothic and Renaissance. Leonardo da Vinci was his guest at Vigevano, and Bramante came to work for him: he finished the famous Tower entitled to him, who had been begun in 1198.


The Road Gallery

The old castle has a unique raised covered road, high enough for horsemen to ride through, that communicates between the new palace and the old fortifications; there is a Falconry, an elegant loggiato supported by 48 columns, and, in the rear area of the mastio, the Ladies' Loggia made for Duchess Beatrice d'Este.

Two views of Piazza Ducale, an enclosed piazza:


Vigevano's main attraction is one of the finest piazzas in Italy, the Piazza Ducale, an elongated rectangle that is almost in the ideal proportions 1:2 advocated by the architectural theorist Antonio Filarete, which is also said to have been laid out by Bramante, and was certainly built for Ludovico il Moro, starting in 1492-93 and completed in record time, unusual for early Renaissance town planning.

Piazza del Duomo was actually planned to form a noble forecourt to his castle, unified by the arcades that completely surround the square, an amenity of the new North Italian towns built in the 13th century. The town's main street enters through a sham arcaded façade that preserves the unity of the space as at the Place des Vosges. Ludovico demolished the former palazzo of the commune of Vigevano to create the space.



In the 17th century one end of the Piazza Ducale was enclosed by the concave Baroque façade of the Cathedral, cleverly adjusted to bring the ancient duomo into a line perpendicular to the axis of the piazza and centered on it.

The Cathedral was begun in 1532 under Duke Francesco II, who commissioned the design to Antonio da Lonate. The edifice was completed in 1606. The interior is on the Latin cross plan, with a nave and two aisles, and houses works by Macrino d'Alba, Bernardino Ferrari and others, as well as tempera polyptych of Leonardesque school.

P.S. Since the 1930S, Viegevano has made itself the shoe center of Italy, a country famous worldwide for shoes, to begin with. The Shoe Museum at Vigevano is a display of shoemaking throught the centuries and includes shoes worn by famous people including
Charlemagne and Louis XVI.


Predictably, the English wire-service report on the Pope's pastoral visits this weekend focuses on his visit to St. Augustine's tomb tomorrow:

Pope to visit tomb of St. Augustine


VATICAN CITY , April 21 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI is traveling to northern Italy for a weekend pilgrimage that will take him to the tomb of St. Augustine, the 5th century theologian who is particularly dear to him.

Benedict is scheduled to celebrate Mass on Saturday afternoon in Vigevano, southwest of Milan, and then on Sunday in Pavia, where the remains of St. Augustine lie in the basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro.

During the trip, the pontiff is expected to visit a local hospital and deliver a speech on culture at Pavia's university.

St. Augustine, who lived from 354-430, had a tremendous impact on Christianity and his writings — among them "City of God" and "Confessions" — are considered by many to be the foundations of western theology.

Benedict is particularly fond of St. Augustine and wrote his doctoral thesis on him in 1953. This year marks the 750th anniversary of the formation of the Augustinians as a single religious order.

Unlike his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, the 80-year-old Benedict has limited his travel. In his two-year pontificate, he has made only a handful of pilgrimages within Italy and beyond. He is due to travel to Brazil next month — his first trip to the Americas as pope.

This story from Avvenire's correspondent in Pavia places the papal visit in better context:

The Pope's visit:
A historical encore for Vigevano
By Antonio Giorgi


VIGEVANO - In Piazza Ducale - a gem of a salon-in-waiting -
they have built a huge altar in front of, but not hiding, the recently-restored facade of the Cathedral of St. Ambrose.

On this stage, in the shadow of Bramante's famous Tower, Pope Benedict XVI will concelebrate Mass this afternoon, in the central moment of brief but intense visit to Vigevano. He will be here less than three hours - from 16:50 when he lands by helicopter from Milan airport, to 19:45 when he leaves by helicopter for Pavia.

But these three hours are pregnant with meaning for the city, for the diocese and for the Lomellina region where, according to Emilio Pastormelo, editor of the Catholic weekly L'Araldo, "every commmune, and everyone, from the social and cultural point of view, feels temselves to be part of that great mosaic of faith that needs every little tile to stay firm and face the future with hope and confidence."

And so, all Vigevano is at its Sunday best - and better. Vatican flags hang from windows and balconies. Posters in tribute to the pope are in every shop window. Signs and streamers everywhere say 'VIGEVANO SALUTA BENeDETTO XVI'.

The organization and preparations have run smoothly. Only once before has a pope been in Vigevano, and that was in 1418. Pope Martin VI was coming from Basel and travelling towards Pavia [even then!], when he stopped at the small rural church of Santa Maria intus Vineas and a few hours of rest.

So much water has passed under the famous bridges across the Ticino river since then, Vigevano and the Lomellina region have changed beyond recognition, and so "This visit by Pope Benedict XVI is an exceptional event, considering that one precedent," says Mayor Ambrogio Cotta Ramusino.

An exception which makes Vigevano proud because it sees this as a rewrd for their never-fulfilled expectation of a visit from Pope John Paul II - the only Lombard diocese that he failed to visit.

It is among the first dioceses outside Rome to be visited by Benedict, and this, because as soon as the Bishop of Vigevano, Claudio Baggini, heard last year that the Pope had been invited to Pavia, he sent the Holy Father an invitation to come to Vigevano as well.

And so, Papa Ratzinger will celebrate Mass at the Piazza Ducale. The choice was not only for esthetic and logistic reasons.

Mayor Ramusino says: "We could say the Piazza Ducale had two fathers, Ludovico il Moro and Bishop Caramuel - representing both the state and the Church. Piazza Ducale represents the harmonious synthesis of two powers, of two common intentions that were miraculously realized in an architectural jewel that is envied by many."

One of the most beautiful piazzas in Italy will be projected to the world by national and regional TV. It can only accommodate 5,000 at the most, but there will be maxi-screens set up in Piazza San'Ambrogio and at the Castello Sforzesco, as well as at various churches in the city: Fatima, Gifra, San Pietro, Addolorata, Sacro Cuore, San Francesco, and in San Lorenzo in nearby Mortara.

Five hundred volunteers will assist pilgrims, 300 persons are assigned to provide medical services, and a thousand will provide security.

This brief encounter with the Pope is an occasion for Vigevano to reflect on its Christian and civilian identity. In embracing the Pope, the city will symbolically communicate to him its concerns and its expectations as well as its intention to have a new identity.

It is a rich city, in many ways opulent. But the widespread affluence hides pockets of poverty. The Lomellina economy is primarily agricultural, rice-based for the most part. Vigevano as its capital is also an important industrial center. The shoe industry alone employs some 4000 people. But technological advances in shoemaking have led to job losses, and the city's employment bureau says job-hunters these days include many who are aged 40 and above.

And so, the city, which presents itself today with all its light and shadows, its faith and its secularism, its hopes and its disappointments, looks to the Pope for words of encouragement and calm.

Avvenire, 21 aprile 2007

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 21/04/2007 16.30]

Pavia all set to welcome
'the pupil of St. Augustine'
By Elisabetta Mancini


PAVIA - "With more meditative attention, we shall understand better the significance of this visit. For now, it is enough to express our sincere gratitude and profound joy - the Pope's visit to Pavia is the sign of a visit from God."

With those words, the Bishop of Pavia, Mons. Giovanni Giudici, announced to his diocese on December 8, 2006, the visit of Pope Benedict XVI which begins tonight.

Twenty-three years after a visit by John Paul II, Pavia welcomes Benedict with "enthusiasm, pride and devotion", according to Mayor Piera Capitelli.

"Pavia has been waiting to celebrate these extraordinary two days," she says. "We hope that our preparations will allow every citizen to follow and take part in this exceptional event despite any temporary inconveniences."

The whole city, she says, has been mobilized "so that the significance of the visit may express itself through and be expressed by the families of Pavia, believers as well as non-believers."

Of course, the Pope's visit to Pavia will culminate under the aegis of St. Augustine, to whom he will render homage tomorrow.

In a question-and-answer session with Roman seminarians on february 17, 2007, the Pope said this about Augustine:

---

What I found fascinating above all was the great humanity in St. Augustine, for whom it was not possible to simply identify himself with the Church because he was a catechumen from the beginning, but had to struggle spiritually to find, gradually, access to the Word of God, to a life with God, until he could give the great Yes to His Church.

This was a very human way, where even today we can see how one begins to come into contact with God, how all the resistance in our nature should be taken seriously and then channeled in order to arrive at the great Yes to the Lord. And so his very personal theology won me over, something that he developed primarily through preaching.

This is important, because initially, Augustine only wanted to live a purely contemplative life, write other books on philosophy. But that was not what the Lord willed. He made him a priest and a bishop, and so the rest of his life and work developed substantially in a dialog with people who were very simple.

He had, on the one hand, to find the meaning of Scripture himself, bearing in mind what the people he would address were capable of, and the context in which they lived, to arrive at preaching a Christianity that was realistic but at the same time very profound.

---

In Pavia, the Pope's last event will be his visit to the Basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro, where the tomb of Augustine is located.

After presiding at Vespers in front of the ornate marble tomb, he will light a votive lamp, most probably with a prayer for dialog and peace among peoples.




Pavia is one of those memorable and incredibly historic cities that dot Italy from north to south and is a must-visit for anyone who finds himself in Milan. I am sorry I cannot find better pictures online to illustrate its treasures.

PRIMER ON PAVIA (from Wikipedia):

Pavia (pronounced Pa-vì-a), the ancient Ticinum, is a town and commune of south-western Lombardy, northern Italy, 35 km south of Milan on the lower Ticino river near its confluence with the Po. It has a population of c. 71,000.


Pavia is the capital of a fertile province known for agricultural products including wine, rice, cereals, and dairy products. Some industries located in the suburbs do not disturb the peaceful atmosphere which comes from the preservation of the city's past and the climate of study and meditation associated with its ancient University. It is the see city of the Roman Catholic diocese of Pavia.

Dating back to pre-Roman times, the town of Pavia (then known as Ticinum) was a municipality and an important military site under the Roman Empire.

Here, in 476, Odoacer defeated Flavius Orestes after a long siege. To punish the city for helping the rival, Odoacer destroyed it completely. However, Orestes was able to escape to Piacenza, where Odoacer followed and killed him, deposing his son Romulus Augustus. This was commonly considered the end of the Western Roman Empire.

A late name of the city in Latin was Papia (probably related to the Pope), which evolved to the Italian name Pavia. Sometimes it's been referred to as Ticinum Papia, combining both Latin names.

Under the Goths, Pavia became a fortified citadel and their last bulwark in the war against Belisarius.

After the Lombard conquest, Pavia became the capital of their kingdom. During the Rule of the Dukes, it was ruled by Zaban. It continued to function as the administrative centre of the kingdom, but by the reign of Desiderius, it had deteriorated as a first-rate defensive work and Charlemagne took it in the Siege of Pavia (June, 774) assuming the kingship of the Lombards. Pavia remained the capital of the Italian Kingdom and the centre of royal coronations until the diminution of imperial authority there in the twelfth century.

In the 12th century Pavia acquired the status of a self-governing commune. In the political division between Guelphs and Ghibellines that characterizes the Italian Middle Ages, Pavia was traditionally Ghibelline [i.e., pro-Pope in the continuing rivalry between Popes and Emperors], a position that was as much supported by the rivalry with Milan, as it was a mark of the defiance of the Emperor that led the Lombard League against the emperor Frederick Barbarossa, who was attempting to reassert long-dormant Imperial influence over Italy.

In the following centuries Pavia was an important and active town. Under the Treaty of Pavia, Emperor Louis IV granted during his stay in Italy the Palatinate to his brother Duke Rudolph's descendants. Pavia held out against the domination of Milan, finally yielding to the Visconti family, rulers of that city in 1359; under the Visconti Pavia became an intellectual and artistic centre, being the seat from 1361 of the University founded around the nucleus of the old school of law, which attracted students from many countries.

The Battle of Pavia (1525) marks a watershed in the city's fortunes, since by that time, the former cleavage between the supporters of the Pope and those of the Holy Roman Emperor had shifted to one between a French party (allied with the Pope) and a party supporting the Emperor and King of Spain Charles V.

Thus during the Valois-Habsburg Italian Wars, Pavia was naturally on the Imperial (and Spanish) side. The defeat and capture of king Francis I of France during the battle ushered in a period of Spanish occupation which lasted until 1713. Pavia was then ruled by the Austrians until 1796, when it was occupied by the French army under Napoleon.

In 1815, it again passed under Austrian administration until the Second War of Independence (1859) and the unification of Italy one year later.



Pavia's most famous landmark is the Certosa, or Carthusian monastery, founded in 1396 and located some kilometers out from the city.

Then, there is the Visconti Castle (Castello Visconteo):



Its most notable churches are:

The Cathedral (Duomo), founded in 1488 and completed only in 1898, when the façade
and the dome were completed according to the original design. The central dome has
an octagonal plan, and stand at 97 m high, weighing some 20,000 tons. This dome is
the third for size in Italy, after St. Peter's Basilica and Santa Maria del Fiore
in Florence.

Next to the Duomo were the Civic Tower (existing at least from 1330 and enlarged
in 1583 by Pellegrino Tibaldi): its fall on March 17, 1989 was the final motivating
force that started the last decade's efforts to save the Leaning Tower of Pisa
from a similar fate.


The Romanesque church of San Michele Maggiore (St. Michael), an outstanding example of
Lombard-Romanesque architecture in Lombardy. It is located on the site of a pre-existing
Lombard church, which the lower part of the campanile belongs to. Destroyed in 1004,
the church was rebuilt from around the end of the 11th century (including the crypt,
the transept and the choir), and finished in 1155. It is characterized by an
extensive use of sandstone and by a very long transept, provided with a façade
and an apse of its own. The Emperor Frederick Barbarossa was crowned here in 1155.


The basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro ("St. Peter in Golden Sky", existing from
the 6th century), where Saint Augustine, Boethius and the Lombard king Liutprand
are buried. The current construction was built in 1132. It is similar to San Michele
Maggiore, differentiating for the asymmetric façade with a saingle portal,
the use of brickwork instead of sandstone, and, in the interior, the absence
of matronei and the shortest transept.


The noteworthy arch housing the relics of St. Augustine
was built in 1362 by artists from Campione, and is
decorated by some 150 statues and reliefs. The church
is mentioned by Dante Alighieri in the X canto of
his Divine Comedy.


The church of Santa Maria del Carmine, one of the
most known examples of Gothic brickwork architecture
in northern Italy. It is the second largest church
in the city after the Cathedral, and is on the Latin-
cross plan, with a perimeter of 80 x 40 meters
comprising a nave and two aisles. The characteristic
façade has a large rose window and seven cusps.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 25/04/2007 4.26]