In Chiesa
The encyclical of Francis conceived and written by his predecessor is not the
only sign of continuity between the two most recent popes. On the "poverty" of
the Church as well there is harmony. It is enough to reread what Ratzinger said
in Freiburg in 2011, in one of the capital discourses of his pontificate
ROME, June 17, 2013 – There have been two news items in recent days that
have shed new light on the relationship that binds Pope Francis to his
predecessor, Benedict XVI.
The first is the announcement, made on June 13 by Jorge Mario Bergoglio himself, of the imminent release of an encyclical written “with four hands”:
“Pope Benedict passed it along it to me. It is a powerful document, even I will say there that I have received this great work: he created it, and I have carried it forward.”
It is the encyclical on faith that pope Joseph Ratzinger had planned to publish after the previous ones dedicated to the other two theological virtues: charity and hope. At the time of his renunciation of the pontificate it was almost finished.
Curiously, the first encyclical of Benedict XVI, "Deus Caritas Est," had also made use of some material prepared during the previous pontificate. But in that case its general construction, and the first of its two great sections in particular, the more theological one, was typically Ratzingerian.
This time, instead, almost the whole composition of the encyclical is by Ratzinger. It is as if pope Bergoglio had limited himself to writing its preface and conclusion. His signature becomes a strong sign of acknowledgement of the pope who preceded him.
*
The second news item instead concerns a book published this year in Germany, it too written "with four hands": by Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, a former president of Cor Unum, and by the theologian and psychiatrist Manfred Lütz, a member of the pontifical academy for life and a consultant to various Vatican offices.
It is a book that right from its title - "The legacy of Benedict and the mission of Francis: Eliminate worldliness from the Church" - is aimed at delineating a continuity between the two popes, in particular between the address delivered by Benedict XVI to "Catholics engaged in the life of the Church and society" on September 25, 2011 in Freiburg, during his last voyage to Germany, and the statements of Francis on the Church as "poor and for the poor."
The two authors presented the book to Ratzinger at the beginning of June, meeting him at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery in the Vatican gardens.
"I live like a monk, I pray and read. I am well," Ratzinger told his two visitors, according to what Lütz reported in the newspaper "Bild" of June 5.
And as for the continuity between him and Francis, he commented: "From the theological point of view we are perfectly in agreement."
The contents of this meeting received scant media coverage. But it must be noted that the address of Benedict XVI in Freiburg also passed unjustifiably under silence when it was delivered, in spite of the fact that it was one of the most significant not only of that voyage to Germany, together with the one to the Bundestag in Berlin, but of the whole pontificate:
> "To remove courageously that which is worldly in the Church…"
The only vaticanista who highlighted the matter from Rome was Andrea Gagliarducci, on his weekly blog in English:
> MondayVatican
___________
BEING CHRISTIANS. FRANCIS' CHURCH CHALLENGE, BENEDICT'S CHURCH CHALLENGE
by Andrea Gagliarducci
"In the concrete history of the Church, however, a contrary tendency is also manifested, namely that the Church becomes self-satisfied, settles down in this world, becomes self-sufficient and adapts herself to the standards of the world."
Moreover: "Not infrequently, she gives greater weight to organization and institutionalization than to her vocation to openness towards God, her vocation to opening up the world towards the other."
And finally: "Once liberated from material and political burdens and privileges, the Church can reach out more effectively and in a truly Christian way to the whole world, she can be truly open to the world."
Who said this?
A first – instinctive – answer to this question would be: Pope Francis. He made "a Church of poverty and for the poor" his mark from his very first meeting with journalists. He, who has increasingly often repeated that "institutions are useful, but up to a point". He even exhorted the future Papal nuncios to “keep their inner freedom.”
The statements at the beginning of this article are actually not Francis’. They are Benedict XVI’s. The now Pope emeritus made those remarks in Freiburg, on September 25, 2011, to Catholics engaged in the life of the Church and society.
Benedict XVI’s words are relevant beyond the German context, even if it is true that the German Church experiences this pitfall in a very specific way. The German Church is wealthy thanks to the kirchensteuer, the State tax – of a considerable amount – on religion. It has been able to multiply social structures and charities, becoming almost self complacent. Thus, the German Church has lost sight of God, while social structures have become the center of its work. The most painful thing is that an ever smaller number of Christians is employed in Catholic-inspired social institutions. However, love and care for the other, an essential aspect of the mission of the Church, came from Christianity. In the name of social services, identity is lost. And, lacking identity, the orientation of the mission of the Church is also lost.
As we noted earlier, this is not only a problem in Germany. Recently, Archbishop Mariano Crociata, Secretary General of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, standing before 200 workers from Catholic-inspired health facilities, underlined the need for all – workers and institutions – to preserve their identity and to have workers properly formed about Catholic principles.
More generally – in the wider context comprising all services and institutions that claim to be Catholic inspired – much has been debated, for example, about the identity of Catholic universities. A debate that has been fierce in the United States. The Cardinal Newman Society is one of the associations that is carrying on the quest for identity: its website is full of denunciations of government interference in the hiring of teachers in Catholic schools and universities. At the same time the Cardinal Newman Society does not hesitate to call attention on universities that are ever more detached from their own Catholic heritage.
A recently released book addresses these issues. Written by the journalist Manfred Luetz and Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, President Emeritus of Cor Unum (the Vatican “dicastery” supporting Catholic charities), “Benedict’s legacy and Francis’ mission” (Benedikts Vermächtnis und Franziskus' Auftrag: Entweltlichung der Kirche, Verlag Herder) delineates a certain continuity between Benedict’s speech in Freiburg and Pope Francis’ words.
Cordes and Luetz presented a copy of the book to Benedict XVI, whom they met at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery, within the Vatican walls, where he is now living. Benedict reportedly agreed: yes, there is a certain theological continuity between his Freiburg speech and Francis’ preaching.
It is still uncertain how Pope Francis will transform this message, captured in well-meaning slogans, into concrete endeavors.
During his pontificate, Benedict XVI not only maintained how important it was for the Church to become "less worldly ". He used the word "demundanization", which means, according to Msgr. Ludwig Müller, to "separate and unify" – but also to build a legal framework to overcome the identity threat. Ultimately, it is a matter of faith. But the question is: how can faith be nurtured if there is not a true adherence to the Gospel when teaching, caring, or carrying on works of charity in the name of the Church?
Under Benedict XVI there was a reform of the Caritas Internationalis constitution, based on the motto Caritas in Veritate, Charity in Truth (not accidentally the title of Benedict XVI’s social encyclical). The motu proprio Intima Ecclesia was also released, to regulate diocesan charities and reinforce the bishops’ oversight over them.
That is the starting point Pope Francis has inherited, and from which he looks onwards to a reform of Pastor Bonus, the apostolic constitution that regulates the work of Curial offices. Will this reform achieve a change of hearts or will it merely be an organizational restructuring?
Ultimately, "it is not a question here of finding a new strategy to re-launch the Church. Rather, it is a question of setting aside mere strategy and seeking total transparency, not bracketing or ignoring anything from the truth of our present situation, but living the faith fully here and now in the utterly sober light of day, appropriating it completely, and stripping away from it anything that only seems to belong to faith, but in truth is mere convention or habit".
Benedict XVI said it in Freiburg. But it seems hardly anyone took note of it at the time.
__________
The book:
Paul Josef Cordes, Manfred Lütz: "Benedikts Vermächtnis und Franziskus' Auftrag: Entweltlichung der Kirche," Verlag Herder, pp. 160, euro 14.99.
__________
Pope Francis announced the encyclical "by four hands" while conversing on June 13 with the members of the ordinary council of the secretariat of the synod of bishops.
The preparatory address for the occasion - which was not delivered - announced "further developments to foster even more the dialogue and collaboration among the bishops and between them and the bishop of Rome."
Improvising, the pope added that the postsynodal exhortation that he is preparing to write will address the topic of "evangelization in general," not only in countries of ancient Christian tradition.
Among the themes to be addressed at a future synod, he called attention back to the problem of the family, since today many people are living together without getting married and marriage is becoming "provisory."
He also called for reflection on the "grave problem" of secularized anthropology. "Secularity has become secularism," he cautioned. And he warned against the risks of Gnosticism and Pelagianism, the infusion of which is now giving rise to a "new culture" that constitutes for Catholics "a very serious anthropological problem."
The first is the announcement, made on June 13 by Jorge Mario Bergoglio himself, of the imminent release of an encyclical written “with four hands”:
“Pope Benedict passed it along it to me. It is a powerful document, even I will say there that I have received this great work: he created it, and I have carried it forward.”
It is the encyclical on faith that pope Joseph Ratzinger had planned to publish after the previous ones dedicated to the other two theological virtues: charity and hope. At the time of his renunciation of the pontificate it was almost finished.
Curiously, the first encyclical of Benedict XVI, "Deus Caritas Est," had also made use of some material prepared during the previous pontificate. But in that case its general construction, and the first of its two great sections in particular, the more theological one, was typically Ratzingerian.
This time, instead, almost the whole composition of the encyclical is by Ratzinger. It is as if pope Bergoglio had limited himself to writing its preface and conclusion. His signature becomes a strong sign of acknowledgement of the pope who preceded him.
*
The second news item instead concerns a book published this year in Germany, it too written "with four hands": by Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, a former president of Cor Unum, and by the theologian and psychiatrist Manfred Lütz, a member of the pontifical academy for life and a consultant to various Vatican offices.
It is a book that right from its title - "The legacy of Benedict and the mission of Francis: Eliminate worldliness from the Church" - is aimed at delineating a continuity between the two popes, in particular between the address delivered by Benedict XVI to "Catholics engaged in the life of the Church and society" on September 25, 2011 in Freiburg, during his last voyage to Germany, and the statements of Francis on the Church as "poor and for the poor."
The two authors presented the book to Ratzinger at the beginning of June, meeting him at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery in the Vatican gardens.
"I live like a monk, I pray and read. I am well," Ratzinger told his two visitors, according to what Lütz reported in the newspaper "Bild" of June 5.
And as for the continuity between him and Francis, he commented: "From the theological point of view we are perfectly in agreement."
The contents of this meeting received scant media coverage. But it must be noted that the address of Benedict XVI in Freiburg also passed unjustifiably under silence when it was delivered, in spite of the fact that it was one of the most significant not only of that voyage to Germany, together with the one to the Bundestag in Berlin, but of the whole pontificate:
> "To remove courageously that which is worldly in the Church…"
The only vaticanista who highlighted the matter from Rome was Andrea Gagliarducci, on his weekly blog in English:
> MondayVatican
___________
BEING CHRISTIANS. FRANCIS' CHURCH CHALLENGE, BENEDICT'S CHURCH CHALLENGE
by Andrea Gagliarducci
"In the concrete history of the Church, however, a contrary tendency is also manifested, namely that the Church becomes self-satisfied, settles down in this world, becomes self-sufficient and adapts herself to the standards of the world."
Moreover: "Not infrequently, she gives greater weight to organization and institutionalization than to her vocation to openness towards God, her vocation to opening up the world towards the other."
And finally: "Once liberated from material and political burdens and privileges, the Church can reach out more effectively and in a truly Christian way to the whole world, she can be truly open to the world."
Who said this?
A first – instinctive – answer to this question would be: Pope Francis. He made "a Church of poverty and for the poor" his mark from his very first meeting with journalists. He, who has increasingly often repeated that "institutions are useful, but up to a point". He even exhorted the future Papal nuncios to “keep their inner freedom.”
The statements at the beginning of this article are actually not Francis’. They are Benedict XVI’s. The now Pope emeritus made those remarks in Freiburg, on September 25, 2011, to Catholics engaged in the life of the Church and society.
Benedict XVI’s words are relevant beyond the German context, even if it is true that the German Church experiences this pitfall in a very specific way. The German Church is wealthy thanks to the kirchensteuer, the State tax – of a considerable amount – on religion. It has been able to multiply social structures and charities, becoming almost self complacent. Thus, the German Church has lost sight of God, while social structures have become the center of its work. The most painful thing is that an ever smaller number of Christians is employed in Catholic-inspired social institutions. However, love and care for the other, an essential aspect of the mission of the Church, came from Christianity. In the name of social services, identity is lost. And, lacking identity, the orientation of the mission of the Church is also lost.
As we noted earlier, this is not only a problem in Germany. Recently, Archbishop Mariano Crociata, Secretary General of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, standing before 200 workers from Catholic-inspired health facilities, underlined the need for all – workers and institutions – to preserve their identity and to have workers properly formed about Catholic principles.
More generally – in the wider context comprising all services and institutions that claim to be Catholic inspired – much has been debated, for example, about the identity of Catholic universities. A debate that has been fierce in the United States. The Cardinal Newman Society is one of the associations that is carrying on the quest for identity: its website is full of denunciations of government interference in the hiring of teachers in Catholic schools and universities. At the same time the Cardinal Newman Society does not hesitate to call attention on universities that are ever more detached from their own Catholic heritage.
A recently released book addresses these issues. Written by the journalist Manfred Luetz and Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes, President Emeritus of Cor Unum (the Vatican “dicastery” supporting Catholic charities), “Benedict’s legacy and Francis’ mission” (Benedikts Vermächtnis und Franziskus' Auftrag: Entweltlichung der Kirche, Verlag Herder) delineates a certain continuity between Benedict’s speech in Freiburg and Pope Francis’ words.
Cordes and Luetz presented a copy of the book to Benedict XVI, whom they met at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery, within the Vatican walls, where he is now living. Benedict reportedly agreed: yes, there is a certain theological continuity between his Freiburg speech and Francis’ preaching.
It is still uncertain how Pope Francis will transform this message, captured in well-meaning slogans, into concrete endeavors.
During his pontificate, Benedict XVI not only maintained how important it was for the Church to become "less worldly ". He used the word "demundanization", which means, according to Msgr. Ludwig Müller, to "separate and unify" – but also to build a legal framework to overcome the identity threat. Ultimately, it is a matter of faith. But the question is: how can faith be nurtured if there is not a true adherence to the Gospel when teaching, caring, or carrying on works of charity in the name of the Church?
Under Benedict XVI there was a reform of the Caritas Internationalis constitution, based on the motto Caritas in Veritate, Charity in Truth (not accidentally the title of Benedict XVI’s social encyclical). The motu proprio Intima Ecclesia was also released, to regulate diocesan charities and reinforce the bishops’ oversight over them.
That is the starting point Pope Francis has inherited, and from which he looks onwards to a reform of Pastor Bonus, the apostolic constitution that regulates the work of Curial offices. Will this reform achieve a change of hearts or will it merely be an organizational restructuring?
Ultimately, "it is not a question here of finding a new strategy to re-launch the Church. Rather, it is a question of setting aside mere strategy and seeking total transparency, not bracketing or ignoring anything from the truth of our present situation, but living the faith fully here and now in the utterly sober light of day, appropriating it completely, and stripping away from it anything that only seems to belong to faith, but in truth is mere convention or habit".
Benedict XVI said it in Freiburg. But it seems hardly anyone took note of it at the time.
__________
The book:
Paul Josef Cordes, Manfred Lütz: "Benedikts Vermächtnis und Franziskus' Auftrag: Entweltlichung der Kirche," Verlag Herder, pp. 160, euro 14.99.
__________
Pope Francis announced the encyclical "by four hands" while conversing on June 13 with the members of the ordinary council of the secretariat of the synod of bishops.
The preparatory address for the occasion - which was not delivered - announced "further developments to foster even more the dialogue and collaboration among the bishops and between them and the bishop of Rome."
Improvising, the pope added that the postsynodal exhortation that he is preparing to write will address the topic of "evangelization in general," not only in countries of ancient Christian tradition.
Among the themes to be addressed at a future synod, he called attention back to the problem of the family, since today many people are living together without getting married and marriage is becoming "provisory."
He also called for reflection on the "grave problem" of secularized anthropology. "Secularity has become secularism," he cautioned. And he warned against the risks of Gnosticism and Pelagianism, the infusion of which is now giving rise to a "new culture" that constitutes for Catholics "a very serious anthropological problem."
