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• Behind Benedict's Vatican Overhaul, by Jeff Israely. Time Sept. 11, 2006:

  So while the Pope enjoys his homecoming this week (Monday he traveled to the small Bavarian town of Marktl am Inn where he was born), Vatican insiders say the beginning of the Benedict era back at the Roman Curia begins in earnest this fall. Some, in fact, predict that Bertone a longtime trusted confidante of the former Cardinal Ratzinger was handpicked to be Secretary of State in order to usher in a virtual revolution in the way Catholic Church headquarters operates. Through an effort that will be part downsizing, part priority overhaul, the theologian pontiff is said to want Church headquarters to be both a more holy and a more efficient entity.
  

  Though the changing of the guards has been more deliberate than some had wanted especially those critical of the power that Sodano had amassed in the last years of John Paul's papacy the new Pope has nonetheless already made some notable personnel moves, with others sure to come. Here are five key changes that have taken place since Benedict took over in April 2005, and five more shifts that may be on the horizon. . . .

  See also " The Pontificate Begins", by Jeffrey Tucker (New Liturgical Movement).
  

  

• September 8, 2006. In his Ad Limina meeting with the Bishops of Ontario, Canada, Pope Benedict once again touched on the perils of relativism:

  Today, the impediments to the spread of Christs Kingdom are experienced most dramatically in the split between the Gospel and culture, with the exclusion of God from the public sphere. Canada has a well-earned reputation for a generous and practical commitment to justice and peace, and there is an enticing sense of vibrancy and opportunity in your multicultural cities. At the same time, however, certain values detached from their moral roots and full significance found in Christ have evolved in the most disturbing of ways. In the name of tolerance your country has had to endure the folly of the redefinition of spouse, and in the name of freedom of choice it is confronted with the daily destruction of unborn children. When the Creators divine plan is ignored the truth of human nature is lost.
  

  False dichotomies are not unknown within the Christian community itself. They are particularly damaging when Christian civic leaders sacrifice the unity of faith and sanction the disintegration of reason and the principles of natural ethics, by yielding to ephemeral social trends and the spurious demands of opinion polls. Democracy succeeds only to the extent that it is based on truth and a correct understanding of the human person. Catholic involvement in political life cannot compromise on this principle; otherwise Christian witness to the splendour of truth in the public sphere would be silenced and an autonomy from morality proclaimed (cf. Doctrinal Note The Participation of Catholics in Political Life, 2-3; 6). In your discussions with politicians and civic leaders I encourage you to demonstrate that our Christian faith, far from being an impediment to dialogue, is a bridge, precisely because it brings together reason and culture. . . .
  

  A particularly insidious obstacle to education today, which your own reports attest, is the marked presence in society of that relativism which, recognizing nothing as definitive, leaves as the ultimate criterion only the self with its desires. Within such a relativistic horizon an eclipse of the sublime goals of life occurs with a lowering of the standards of excellence, a timidity before the category of the good, and a relentless but senseless pursuit of novelty parading as the realization of freedom. Such detrimental trends point to the particular urgency of the apostolate of intellectual charity which upholds the essential unity of knowledge, guides the young towards the sublime satisfaction of exercising their freedom in relation to truth, and articulates the relationship between faith and all aspects of family and civic life. Introduced to a love of truth, I am confident that young Canadians will relish exploring the house of the Lord who "enlightens every person who comes into the world (Jn 1:9) and satisfies every desire of humanity.

  (Hat tip: Rocco Palmo @ Whispers in the Loggia).
  

• September 5 was the memorial of Mother Teresa of Calcutta, recognized as a model of Christian love in the Pope's first encyclical -- two of the three times in connection with the mention of saints. Teresa Polk has the references.
  

• Generation Benedikt - The PRF (Papa Ratzinger Forum) reports that

  A group of 12 young Catholics from Germany, France, Italy, Mexico and the USA decided to start on the first anniversary of WYD in Kln an international platform for young people identifying themselves with the message of Pope Benedict XVI. The inauguration took place 26/08 in the Archdiocese of Kln. [website: Generation Benedikt].

  
  
• In our July 2006 roundup we linked to Pope or Heretic? An Evaluation of Pope Benedict XVI, LumenGentleman Apologetics' examination of "radtrad heresy hunters" who are plumbing the writings of then-Joseph Ratzinger, just as they did with his predecessor. In The Hunt for Heresy: Dr. Droleskey vs. Cardinal Ratzinger, LumenGentleman Apologetics' Jacob Michael revisits the topic, addressing a new attack on the Pope by Dr. Droleseky:

  Lately, Dr. Droleskey has gotten cozy with the Sedevacantist position, which appears to have emboldened him to step up the harsh invective against the Roman Pontiff. His August 21, 2006 article, "A New Theology for a New Religion", tops out at some 75 pages of single-spaced text, 50 pages of which are filled with interminably long quotes from other writers.

  
  

  The weakness of Dr. Droleskey, one he shares with many critics of the Pope, is that "he does not understand what he is reading in Ratzinger":

  Whatever suspicion might remain that Droleskey just "doesn't get it" is confirmed by the few words of commentary that he does interject. The article purports to be a kind of analysis of Ratzinger's book, Principles of Catholic Theology, but in reality it is little more than a collection of lengthy quotes from Ratzinger's work, juxtaposed against equally lengthy quotes from 19th-20th century popes, with a few of Droleskey's own words of righteous indignation serving as a shaky bridge between the two. . . . READ MORE

  Droleskey was profiled in a recent e-letter by Catholic apologist Karl Keating, asking:

  Once he was able to get the attention of a third of New York's Republican voters. Now he struggles to get anyone's attention. It is not likely that many of those voters would recognize the candidate of 1998 in the itinerant essayist of 2006. What happened?

  Dr. Droleskey: a warning to those who presume themselves to be "more Catholic than the Pope."
  

• Benedict, The Peace Pope. National Catholic Register Sept. 3-9, 2006. Angelo Matera (editor of Godspy.com), takes a look at Pope Benedict's response to the August-2006 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah/Lebanon and takes a swipe at "Catholic hawks in the United States." (Discussion of the article at Amy Welborn's).
  

• The Pope Rewrites the Handbook of the Good Pastor, by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa. Sept. 5, 2006:

  Fielding questions in public and responding spontaneously is one of the hallmarks of pope Joseph Ratzingers communication style.
  

  He used this method on October 15, 2005, with the children who had received their first communion that year crowded into Saint Peters Square. And he did so on April 6 of this year, again in Saint Peters Square, with the young people preparing for World Youth Day.
  

  Each time, the pope seeks to adapt his responses to the audience in front of him.
  

  To the priests of the diocese of Albano, in fact, he delivered what almost amounted to a handbook on good pastoral ministry: how to celebrate Mass, how to recite the breviary, how to administer the sacraments, how to draw near those far away, how to be faithful to the duty of chastity, how to show to married couples the beauty of matrimony, and to young people the conversion of a Saint Francis. . . .

  According to Magister, the complete transcript of his conversation with the priests of Albano numbers a good 6,000 words in length, was released by the Vatican press office the following day, and appeared in the September 2 edition of LOsservatore Romano in Italian only. Magister produces about a third of the exchange; Teresa @ the Papa Ratzinger Forum has another transcript, and here is the complete Italian text of the exchange from the Vatican Website. (Hat tip, Amy Welborn).

  Previous transcripts of spontaneous "Q&A's" with the Holy Father are archived here @ the Pope Benedict XVI Fan Club.
  

  

• Dissident Kueng criticises pope during German visit Deutsche Presse Agentur. Sept. 13, 2006. Speaking at his home in Tuebingen, Germany, disgruntled theologian Hans Keung berated the Pope for being an old fuddy-duddy and neglecting the path of reform:

  [Kung] slammed Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday for not offering dialogue during a six-day visit to Germany. There had not been "a single future-oriented signal" from the pope, nor were there any suggestions of reforms on the way, Kueng told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa in an interview.
  

  Kueng, who was invited to a long lunch and talk with Benedict in Italy last year, said the visit had made a contradictory impression.
  

  "He didn't fulfil any of the hopes of reform-oriented Catholics. . . .

  I find that it's easier to understand Kung if you understand his reference to "dialogue" as a keyword for "capitulation". For instance:

  [Kung] said Benedict had been "tactically smart to stay silent about the rule of celibacy for priests, or the ban on contraceptives and other uncomfortable Roman rules.
  

  "He was always stressing the nice side of faith and the church and leaving the harsh church rules that still exist unmentioned."
  

  Kueng added, "I don't see dialogue in practice."

  And to think it was only last September and in the first year of his pontificate that Pope Benedict had invited his former academic colleague for a friendly four-hour-long chat over dinner, culminating in the Swiss theologian's praise of the invitation as a "sign of hope for many in the church with the same vision as mine."
  

  Past articles on the Ratzinger-Kung relationship, see The Effluence of Kung, The Brevity of Ratzinger Against The Grain January 5, 2005; "Kung's Gripe" (in which he accused Cardinal Ratzinger with "manipulating the papal conclave with a campaign to have Pope John Paul made a saint") and the Sept. 27, 2005 Pope Benedict Roundup on the Benedict-Kung meeting.
  

On a Lighter Note . . .

• Recollections from Pope's former housekeeper Independent Catholic News Sept. 21, 2006. Sister Agapita, of the Sisters of Mercy convent in Munich, was a housekeeper to Cardinal Ratzinger, before he became Pope Benedict XVI. She was one of 50 people who received Communion from the Pope during his recent Mass at Munich-Riem. Sr Agapita reminisced with journalist Tess Crebbin:

  "We spent many joyful moments together," she said by phone. "It was much more than just your average housekeeper-Cardinal relationship, because he really involved us in his daily life and we also used to pray together." [...]

  Sister Agapita related how, when the Pope John Paul II was shot, Cardinal Ratzinger immediately " gathered all of us around to say the rosary together with him for the Pope's recovery. I thought it was really significant that he had asked his staff to join him in prayer, fostering among us the feeling of community and union."

  
  
• Also interviewed this month by the Catholic News Agency is Thaddus Khnel, the Popes courier, chauffuer, friend, and confidant Munich, Sep. 07, 2006 (CNA):

  Khnel, who is Director of the Bank of Munich, met then Cardinal Ratzinger in 1978 at the home of the Sisters of Mercy at Bad Adelholzen. In an interview with German television, Khnel explained that he is known as the Popes courier because when Cardinal Ratzinger was called to work in the Roman curia, he offered to bring Bavarian things to him in Rome, which he did and still does to this day.

  The first thing I brought to Rome, in my car, was a paschal candle, as well as some fruit from Adelholzen and mineral water. For Christmas I brought him his Advent wreath, as they cant be easily found in Italy. Up to now I have brought some 40 different objects, Khnel explained. He likes the Christmas cookies that women from Bavarian parishes bake at home as well as those made at certain monasteries. He also likes the chocolates made in Aachen, he added.

  Khnel said hes also acted as Cardinal Ratzingers chauffuer and that he often picked him up at the airport and brought him to Pentling or Ratisbona to his brothers home. Sometimes I drove the whole familythe cardinal, his brother Georg and their sister Maria. The little trips we took to Mallersdorf, Brixen, Linz, Klagenfurt, and Bad Hofgasteinmost of the time with the entire familywere very beautiful, Khnel said. . . .

  According to Tess Crebbin of the Catholic News Service, Khnel was invited to spend the night in the Regensburg seminary with the pontiff during his Sept. 9-14 trip to Germany:

  
  "I was very surprised and honored when I received a letter stating that I am to stay overnight at Regensburg," Thaddaeus Kuehnel, director of the Hauck and Aufhauser private bank in Munich, told Catholic News Service. "The request came from the Regensburg seminary, by letter."

  Kuehnel said he did not know why he received an invitation when so many of the pope's other friends remain uncertain if they will have a chance to meet with him.

  "It may have something to do with the fact that our friendship goes back some 30-odd years," Kuehnel said. "Long before he became pope, when he faced controversy at home and abroad, I always spoke out for him, and I think he never forgot this.

  
  
• The Associated Press tried to downplay Benedict's homecoming with some pre-emptive liberal spin, claiming that "Many Germans [are] still skeptical about native son Pope Benedict XVI" (International Herald Tribune Sept. 8, 2006):

  "I think he's a man of the past, and he's trying to cement these conservative tendencies in place," said Rupert Kreuzpaintner, a churchgoing Catholic from Landshut in Benedict's home region of Bavaria who sees the pope as too authoritarian within the church.
  

  Although he is critical of Benedict, "my faith is not affected by that," said Kreuzpaintner, 45. "But for me it is a revolting thing, that a Godlike cult is made around such a person who stands for exactly the opposite of what the message should be."

  Prompting some readers to wonder just which parish the "churchgoing Catholic" Kreuzpaintner has been attending? -- The article goes on to note that "Munich police expect at least 500,000 visitors in the Bavarian capital."
  

  On the other hand, Germany is "Finding Religion" (TheTrumpet.com Sept. 21, 2006):

  Germans warm reception to Pope Benedicts visit to his native Bavaria last week, coupled with the broader trend toward recognizing the religious underpinnings of Europe, are signs that the secularism of Europe is on the way out.

  
  
• Benedetto, der Leuchtturm" ["Benedict the Light House"] Der Spiegel Sept. 9, 2006. Gerald Augustinus (Closed Cafeteria) provides us with a english translation. After describing the Catholic Church as having been "the boogeyman in the eyes of the average progressive German, the incarnation of a spirit hostile to enlightenment, the head of the worst reactionary bigotry, representative of the Middle Ages, holding on stubbornly", Der Spiegel observes a "sea change" in the relationship between church and society, "the motor of which", suprisingly, was the Catholic Church:

  n 2005, the year of the change of Popes and World Youth Day in Cologne centuries-old abilities of Catholicism coincided with new styles of expression fo the media and event society. In contrast to the liturgically, spiritually and ritualistically rather stuffy Protestantism, Catholicism has always been a religion of senses, theater and demonstrative stagings. With the Pope as its hea it could and can personalize its message worldwide.
  

  This potential to produce images, to create a charismatic aura, to move masses of people to pilgrimages has been fully used by Catholicism in its nature of a robust, global, organized and experienced institution - and the media hungrily bought it. The pictures of the Polish Pope went around the world - his folksy approach to the faithful, dignified blessings and his increasing suffering that he defied like a grand martyr, who even and especially in his dying electrified the Catholic masses.
  

  World Youth Day became an image-rich spectacle, where the charismatic cult of the Pope with its vivacious waves of hundreds of thousands of young people even captivated the cool intellectual Joseph Ratzinger. "We are Pope" the Bild newspaper famously headlined - and the young crowds chanted "Benedetto, Benedetto."

  As one reader notes, "It looks as if one typical stereotype is still prominant. Nothing is said about the Church's intellectual appeal."
  

  Still, Gerard observes about another Spiegel article on the Pope's visit:

  [Der Spiegel is] definitely friendlier since Pope John Paul II. died. It used to be the magazine for all the whiners - Kueng, Drewermann, Ranke-Heinemann etc. The latter two have since left the Church. Rebellion suddenly isn't that cool anymore but rather something very old-fashioned. Heck, the article's even called "Joseph's Return" and misses the usual snarky remarks.

  
  

• Coming to us by way of Jimmy Akin), New Zealand website OddStuff relays the story that Pope Benedict's father met his mother by advertising for a wife in a local Roman Catholic newspaper:

  Bild am Sonntag (BamS) said 43-year-old Joseph Ratzinger senior placed an advertisement as a "low-level civil servant" seeking "a good Catholic girl, who can cook and sew a bit ... to marry as soon as possible, preferably with a picture," in a Bavarian paper in March 1920.

  Four months later by now a "mid-ranking civil servant" he posted a similar notice in the same paper, and this time received a reply from Maria Peintner, the Pope's future mother, BamS reported, citing documents from Bavarian state archives.

  Joseph Ratzinger senior and Maria Peintner were married in November 1920.

  Click here for the original article from Bild am Sonntag, with photos of Joseph's parents and a shot of "baby Ratzinger."
  

• "Benedictwiser, the Pope of Beers", by Curt Jester / Photo via Greg Krehbiel:

  This beer has a real great head and talk about theology on tap. Plus it is not weak like those heretical dissident beers. You know the ones that are all watered down. Pope Benedict Beer is fine with fish, meat, biblical exegesis, Magisterial documents, and spiritual reading. Great also for preparing to talk with dissidents or anyone you know you will be at lagerheads with.

  
  

Reactions to the Papal Visit to Turkey

Note: For pre-trip and day-by-day coverage, see Anticipating Pope Benedict's Papal Visit to Turkey Nov. 24, 2006 and Pope Benedict XVI's Apostolic Journey to Turkey Nov. 28 - Dec. 1, 2006 Nov. 30, 2006.

• Pope: Thanks to Church of Turkey that lives Advent like Mary Dec. 3, 2006. In his Angelus for the first Sunday of Advent, the Pope recalled "with grateful affection, the dear Catholic community that lives in Turkish territory":

  "I was able to meet and celebrate Holy Mass together with these brothers and sisters of ours, who are in conditions that are often not easy. It is truly a small flock, varied, rich in enthusiasm and faith, which we may say lives constantly and in an intense fashion the experience of Advent sustained by hope."
  

  At the heart of Advent, continued the pontiff, lies precisely the certainty of hope. "In Advent, the liturgy repeatedly tells us and assures us, almost as if to win over our natural diffidence, that God 'comes': he comes to stay with us, in every situation we face; he comes to live among us, to live with us and in us; he comes to fill the distances that divide and separate us; he comes to reconcile us with Him and among ourselves. He comes into the history of mankind, to knock on the door of every man and woman of goodwill, to bring to individuals, families and people the gift of brotherhood, harmony and peace. For this reason, Advent is, par excellence, a time of hope, during which those who believe in Christ are invited to remain in vigilant and diligent anticipation, fed by prayer and by proactive commitment to love. May the drawing near of the Christmas of Christ fill the hearts of all Christians with joy, serenity and peace!"

  Not everybody received Benedict's comments on Turkey kindly. According to Le Journal Chretien:

  Ankaras top government religious official accused Pope Benedict XVI yesterday of doing injustice to Turkey by declaring after his historic visit to Turkey last week that the countrys Catholics live under difficult conditions. . . .

  In an interview with the semi-official Anatolian News Agency published in todays liberal Radikal newspaper, Director of Religious Affairs Ali Bardakoglu complained that the problems of Turkeys religious minorities had been exaggerated during the popes visit.

  The popes comments [in his Sunday Dec. 3 address] caused the foreign press to conclude, Bardakoglu objected, that Turkey does not have religious freedom. This is an injustice to Turkey.

  
  

  According to John Allen, Jr., "six times over the course of his four-day visit, Benedict either made the case for religious freedom, or referred in oblique fashion to the trials of the local Christian community." In Benedict and religious freedom in Turkey, Allen collects in one place all of Benedicts references to religious freedom during the course of the Turkey trip.
  

• Istanbul returns to normality, but deep down something has changed with the Pope\'s visit, by Mavi Zambak. AsiaNews.it. Dec. 1, 2006. Benedict XVI has returned to Rome, but they're still celebrating his visit at Istanbul's cathedral. "After having felt the Pope's closeness, we feel stronger." The Muslim community also sees the visit positively; the Pope's prayers in the mosque overshadow the Regensburg controversy.
  

• Patriarch Bartholomew I on the Papal Visit - Dec. 1, 2006. Zenit News interviewed Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I, who confided that he had made "an ecumenical proposal" to the Holy Father:

  We can truly say that this Thursday we lived a historic day, under many aspects. Historic for ecumenical dialogue and, as we saw in the afternoon, historic for the relationship between cultures and religions. And, obviously, because of all this, historic also for our country. . . .
  

  I can say that I spoke with His Holiness of something -- something that we could do. I presented him with a proposal which I cannot now elaborate on, as we await an official response, but I can say that His Holiness was very interested and that he received it favorably.
  

  We hope it can be undertaken as it is directed to that ecumenical progress that, as we have affirmed and written in the common declaration, both of us are determined to pursue.

  
  
• Fr. Richard J. Neuhaus: "The Pope in Turkey" First Things' "On The Square" Dec. 1, 2006:

  The meetings and prayers with the Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew I, will not likely be called historic. Historic was the visit of Pope Paul VI four decades ago when mutual excommunications between East and West were formally withdrawn. Benedict shares fully John Paul the Greats yearning for the day when East and West will once again breathe with both lungs. As for Orthodoxy, however, while Constantinople may have preeminence in tradition, Russia has the numbers and the clout, and relations with Russia continue to be prickly, at best. Yet it is noteworthy that the formal dialogue between Rome and Orthodoxy has been resumed after a hiatus of six months, and there are continuing rumblings that Benedict may yet be invited to visit Russia.

  The visit to Constantinople/Istanbul was, of course, on St. Andrews Day. The brothers, Peter and Andrew, were, in the persons of Benedict and Bartholomew, together, both praying for the day of communion fully restored. As Benedict has said on many occasions, the hope for Christian unity is not a matter of our goals and schedules but of waiting faithfully on an unanticipated movement of the Holy Spirit that is, thank God, not under our control.

  For more on the Russian Orthodox Church's reaction, see Russian Church hopes for Christian dialogue resulting form Pope's visit to Turkey Interfax-Religion.com Dec. 4, 2006.
  

• Wobby Pope? Open Book Dec. 6, 2006. Amy Welborn takes a look at the raft of "Has the Pope gone soft?" op-eds in the press:

  The trouble lies in the word "dialogue." Secular journalists (and others) don't understand this term in the same way that the Pope is using it. They seem to think that "dialogue" must mean: "Conversations between people of differing views, with the ultimate purpose of finding what we believe in common, discarding everything else, and making that common belief the basis of a new religious understanding." . . .

  However - when Benedict speaks of "dialogue" - that's not what he means. And his definition of "dialogue" and its purpose fits quite well into his strong commitment to the truth of Catholicism.

  Joseph Ratzinger, as a theologian, was a firm believer in and devotee of "dialogue," as is any real intellectual. It is possible - and this is what is so hard for many to understand - to hold firmly to what one believes is Truth, and be very interested in dialogue, the views and experiences of others, not simply out of curiosity, but to the view of expanding one's own vision and understanding.

  
  
• "The Pope on Turkey, Secularism and Islam", by Mustafa Aykol. The White Path Dec. 7, 2006. Turkish journalist Mustafa on Benedict's dual challenge: to "secular fundamentalism, which aims to destroy the whole "public relevance" of God, and religious fundamentalism, which is prone to use coercion and violence to impose its beliefs on others" and its reception by the Turkish government.
  

• Analyzing Benedicts prayer with Ratzingers criteria, by John Allen, Jr. National Catholic Reporter Dec. 8, 2006:

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

  This was, after all, the same champion of Catholic identity who said of Pope John Paul IIs 1986 summit of religious leaders in Assisi to pray together for peace -- or, at least, of the way that event was understood in some circles -- This cannot be the model!

  [...] Weve reached an interesting moment indeed in Catholic affairs when such complaints could be hurled against the man once known as Gods Rottweiler for his ferocious defense of the faith.
  

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

  The answer, says Allen, lies in an examination of then-Cardinal Ratzingers thought on prayer with followers of other religions, as expounded in 2003's Truth & Tolerance.
  

  After noting Cardinal Kasper's attempt at public relations:

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

  With all due respect to Kasper, widely recognized as one of the best theological minds in the church, its a bit of a stretch to say that something carried live on TV across much of the world was not public.

  Allen turns his attention to the Pope's remarks during the general audience on December 6th, 2006:

  In the area of interreligious dialogue, divine Providence granted me, almost at the end of my Journey, an unscheduled Visit which proved rather important: my Visit to Istanbul's famous Blue Mosque. Pausing for a few minutes of recollection in that place of prayer, I addressed the one Lord of Heaven and earth, the Merciful Father of all humanity. May all believers recognize that they are his creatures and witness to true brotherhood!

  
  To which Allen observes:

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

  Why the explanatory vacuum? The answer, at least implicitly, seems to be the following: This pope is his own gloss.
  

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

  Probably the best analysis of the papal "prayer" in the Blue Mosque.
  

• Turkish mufti would not match Pope's gesture" Catholic World News. Dec. 6, 2006:

  Turkeys top Islamic official has conceded that he would not be prepared to make the sort of gesture that Pope Benedict XVI made last week, when the Holy Father prayed silently at the Blue Mosque.
  

  In response to a journalists question about a reciprocal gesture, Ali Bardakoglu, the governments religion minister, said: It is not right to expect that others will pray as the Pope did.

  
  

Benedict, Regensberg, The West and Islam, Continued

• The Pope and Islam (Symposium) - The Popes visit to Turkey highlights the Muslim world's violent reaction to the Pontiff's comments about Islam several weeks ago. What did those comments, and the Muslim worlds response to them, really mean? To discuss these issues with us today, Frontpage Symposium has assembled a distinguished panel, with Turkish / Muslim journalist Mustafa Aykol, Thomas Haidon (Legal Advisor of the Free Muslim Coalition), BBC commentator Serge Trifkovic and Bat Yeor (author of Islam and Dhimmitude 2001 and Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis 2005).
  

• The Man in Whites Burden: Who else but the pope can speak for Christianity?, by Father Raymond J. de Souza. National Review November 30, 2006.
  

• The Pope and the Prophet, by Robert R. Reilly. Crisis November 8, 2006:

  The pope has raised a very volatile question: Is, in fact, the God of Islam without reason, or above it? Is the Muslim God unreasonable? Is Islam, therefore, based upon a theological deformation? The popes allusion to the teachings of eleventh-century Islamic philosopher Ibn HaznGod is not bound even by his own wordsuggests that possibility. However, it is more than a possibility. It is a core teaching of one of the predominant strains of Islam, if not the predominant strain. Has this always been so? How did such a conception of God develop? Is it still possible to talk about this without threats of murder? Benedict is trying to start a conversation with Islam, and it is the only one really worth having.

  
  
• What Benedict means by 'Christian tradition', by John Allen, Jr.:

  "He can't have it both ways," one colleague in the press corps said to me.
  

  Grasping how these two points -- fraternal relations with Muslims and the preservation of Europe's Christian identity -- are not opposed, at least as far as Benedict XVI is concerned, requires understanding what he means by "Christian tradition."

  
  Benedict's desire isn't a return to Christendom, a conflation of church and state. Neither does he "seek a Christian version of shariah, which would enshrine the Code of Canon Law as the civil law of the land" and "[consign] Muslims or other religious minorities to second-class citizenship." Rather, what Benedict means by "Christian Tradition" is twofold:

  
  First, he wants Europe to be shaped by its religious heritage and by the values of its religious communities, in contrast to forms of secularism that would deny any public role to religious believers. [...]
  

  Second, the pope wants to defend the bundle of traditional moral values associated with Christian teaching, such as the family, human life, sexual morality, social justice and peace.
  

  
  Read the rest.
  

• The Soul of the West | An interview with Fr. James V. Schall, S.J. on Benedict XVI's Regensberg Address Ignatius Insight Nov. 9, 2006. Recently, in the course of doing some research for the Harvard Political Review, Justin Murray, an undergraduate student at Harvard, sent Fr. James V. Schall a series of questions about the impact of Pope Benedict XVI's September 12, 2006, Regensburg Lecture. Ignatius Insight publishes the interview w. kind permission of the authors.
  

Pope Benedict XVI in Print

• The recent anthology Political Theologies: Public Religions in a Post-Secular World, edited by Hent de Vries, Editor Lawrence E. Sullivan is available from Fordham U. Included is an English translation of the historic discussion between Jrgen Habermas and Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, concerning the prepolitical moral foundations of a republic. The opening statements of the Habermas/Ratzinger dialogue are available in original German here, in Spanish here.
  

  Habermas vs. The Pope - An appraisal of the dialogue from Prospect magazine, the author, Edward Skidelsky, suprised at how much a leftist, secular philosopher and an 'enforcer of doctrinal orthodoxy' could agree upon.
  

  See also: The Church and the Secular Establishment: A Philosophical Dialog between Joseph Ratzinger and Jrgen Habermas (Logos Vol. 9, No. 2 Spring 2006), an English-language summary and translation from the journal of the Catholic Studies program at St. Thomas University in St. Paul. (Via John McGreevy / Commonweal).
  

• Catholic News Agency reports that [then] Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger's Introduction to Christianity has been published in Russian for the first time:

  The book, written in 1968 by the man who is now Pope Benedict XVI, includes a foreword by Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, chairman of the Russian Orthodox Churchs foreign department. The publication was co-financed by the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN).
  

  Peter Humeniuk, an expert in Catholic-Orthodox relations, who heads ACNs section for relations with the Russian Orthodox Church, said this week that the translations publication will provide an excellent step forward in ecumenical relations. It is of utmost importance that this reference work by one of the worlds most important theologians is now accessible to Russian readers, especially in academies and seminaries, he said.

  
  

• "Primacy in Love": The Chair Altar of Saint Peter's in Rome Ignatius Insight posts an excerpt from the recently published Images of Hope: Meditations on Major Feasts, a meditative walk through the liturgical calendar by Pope Benedict XVI.
  

• Benedict XVI has finished the first part of a book entitled Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration, which will be published next spring" reports Zenit News Service:

  The announcement was made today by the Vatican Publishing House -- also known as Libreria Editrice Vaticana, or LEV -- which received the Pope's manuscript a few days ago, and has been entrusted with its distribution.
  

  "Conscious of the expectation at the world level of this first work of Benedict XVI," the announcement said, "the LEV has made the appropriate agreements with Rizzoli Publishing House, ceding to the latter the rights of translation, diffusion and commercialization of the work worldwide."

  
  According to the Catholic News Service:

  Pope Benedict explained that he began the book during his 2003 summer vacation, giving the final form to the first four chapters in the summer of 2004.
  

  "After my election to the episcopal see of Rome, I used all of my free moments to work on it," he wrote. "Because I do not know how much time and how much strength I will still be given, I have decided to publish the first 10 chapters" as Volume One of "Jesus of Nazareth."

  
  

  The announcement raised the interesting question of how one should receive a work of personal theology by a Pope. Zenit News further reports:

  In the preface, passages of which have been issued, the Pope writes that this work "in no way is an act of the magisterium, but only an expression of my personal search for the face of the Lord. Therefore, anyone is free to contradict me."
  

  "I only ask readers for that anticipated sympathy without which there can be no understanding," the Holy Father states.
  

  "I wished to attempt to present the Jesus of the Gospels as the authentic Jesus, as the historical Jesus in the authentic meaning of the word," Benedict XVI adds.
  

  The book expresses one of Joseph Ratzinger's most profound convictions, a book which he had already planned to write before being elected Pope: "Through the man Jesus, God made himself visible and, from God, the image is seen of the just man."

  In an unfortunate, though not altogether unsurprising, response, Malcolm Moore of the UK Telegraph revealed his complete ignorance of matters Catholic with the proclamation that the Pope questioned his infallibility:

  The Pope has shocked theologians and opened a chink in the theory of papal infallibility by saying that people should feel free to disagree with what he has written in his latest book, a meditation on Jesus Christ. . . . No Pope has ever opened up his work and opinions to criticism before. Nor has any Pope tried to separate his personal and public personas, according to Professor Giuseppe Alberigo, a professor of the history of the Catholic Church at Bologna University.

  "I really believe this is the first time this has ever happened," he said. "It is an extraordinarily important gesture. What it means is that the Pope is not totally infallible. As well as being the Pope, he is a common man, hugely studious in this case, but like all men he is subject to debates, arguments and discussions." He added that Pope John Paul II "could never have made a distinction between 'official' Pope and 'ordinary' Pope".

  In a word, nonsense.
  

  Related Discussion anticipating the publication of Jesus of Nazareth:

  
  
  • Pope Benedict & the Historical Jesus, by Michael Barber, Professor of Theology, Scripture and Catholic Thought at John Paul the Great Catholic University in San Diego. (Singing in the Reign [blog] Nov. 22, 2006).
    
  • From Zenit News, a translation of excerpts from the Preface of the first volume of the book Jesus of Nazareth which Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI will publish next spring. The excerpts were made available by Rizzoli, the publishing house that has been given the international rights.
    
  • "Rome in Crisis?" - Zadok the Roman takes Professor Giuseppe Alberigo to the woodshed:

    High-level meetings between the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (The Holy Office), the Rectors of the Pontifical Universities and the standing committee of the International Theological Commission have struggled to come up with a plan of action following the Papal decree abolishing infallibility. . . . Or not.

    
    
  • Jesus of Nazareth will be published by Random House imprint Doubleday - The first book from Benedict since he became pope, the title is scheduled for publication in spring 2007. Bill Barry, v-p and publisher of Doubledays religious division, acquired world English, first serial, audio and exclusive Spanish-language rights in North America from Italian publisher Rizzoli. [Publisher's Weekly]. This is somewhat of a change given that Ignatius Press is the traditional publisher of the Pope's works in the English-language.
    
  
  

Ecumenical Ventures

• Pope Benedict's meeting with Rowan Williams, the Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, on November 23, 2006 was perhaps overshadowed by his subsequent visit to Turkey and dialogue with the Orthodox. According to CatholicOnline.org the Pope and the Anglican primate acknowledged serious obstacles to "ecumenical progress":

  Serious obstacles remain to form closer ties between Catholic and Anglican churches, Pope Benedict XVI and Anglican leader Rowan Williams agreed, bluntly acknowledging disagreements on the ordination of gay bishops and women priests and the blessing of same-sex unions. . . .

  After a Nov. 23 private morning meeting between the pope and the archbishop of Canterbury, the two religious leaders signed a common declaration that noted the historic meeting 40 years ago by their predecessors, Pope Paul VI and Archbishop Michael Ramsey, which undertook "to establish a dialogue in which matters which had been divisive in the past might be addressed from a fresh perspective with truth and love."
  

  That 1966 meeting aimed at uniting the churches split apart in 1534 by English King Henry VIII's anger over the Vatican's refusal to annul his marriage.
  

  Benedict XVII and Archbishop Ramsey in the joint statement, signed while sitting side-by-side at a table, expressed gratitude for the efforts at unity and pledged to pursue the path of continuing dialogue.
  

  
  

  Related Links:
  

  
  
  • Joint Declaration of Benedict XVI and Rowan Williams Nov. 23, 2006.
    
  • Papal Address to Archbishop of Canterbury:

    ". . . Over the last three years you have spoken openly about the strains and difficulties besetting the Anglican Communion and consequently about the uncertainty of the future of the Communion itself. Recent developments, especially concerning the ordained ministry and certain moral teachings, have affected not only internal relations within the Anglican Communion but also relations between the Anglican Communion and the Catholic Church. We believe that these matters, which are presently under discussion within the Anglican Communion, are of vital importance to the preaching of the Gospel in its integrity, and that your current discussions will shape the future of our relations. It is to be hoped that the work of the theological dialogue, which had registered no small degree of agreement on these and other important theological matters, will continue [to] be taken seriously in your discernment. In these deliberations we accompany you with heartfelt prayer. It is our fervent hope that the Anglican Communion will remain grounded in the Gospels and the Apostolic Tradition which form our common patrimony and are the basis of our common aspiration to work for full visible unity.

    
    
  • Anglican's Address to Benedict XVI:

    I say this, conscious that the path to unity is not an easy one, and that disputes about how we apply the Gospel to the challenges thrown up by modem society can often obscure or even threaten the achievements of dialogue, common witness and service. In the modem world, no part of the Christian family acts without profound impact on our ecumenical partners; only a firm foundation of friendship in Christ will enable us to be honest in speaking to one another about those difficulties, and discerning a way forward which seeks to be wholly faithful to the charge laid upon us as disciples of Christ. I come here today, therefore, to celebrate the ongoing partnership between Anglicans and Roman Catholics, but also ready to hear and to understand the concerns which you will wish to share with me.

    
    
  • Archbishop William's visit to Rome marks the 40th anniversary of the groundbreaking trip to Rome by Archbishop Michael Ramsey, in March 1966. In Alive at the Dawn The Tablet Nov. 11, 2006), Chris Larkman, a seminarian alive at the time reminisces. (via Whispers in the Loggia).
    

  • On November 21, 2006, Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams spoke at St. Anselmo, a Benedictine institution in Rome. The subject of his talk was Benedict and the future of Europe.
    
  
  

• 
  A somewhat happier and more optimistic ecumenical moment occurred on December 14th, 2006, when Archbishop Christodoulos visited Benedict XVI at the Vatican. Zenit News reports:

  A first visit of an Orthodox archbishop of Athens and All Greece to a Pope at the Vatican marked an important step in overcoming the division between Orthodox and Catholics.
  

  Today's historic meeting between Archbishop Christodoulos and Benedict XVI ended with the signing of a joint declaration by the two religious leaders to reaffirm the collaboration of Orthodox and Catholics, particularly in the defense of life and the recovery of Europe's Christian roots.
  

  This was not the Greek archbishop's first visit to the Vatican, though it was his first to the Pope. Archbishop Christodoulos had met Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then dean of the College of Cardinals, on the occasion of Pope John Paul II's funeral on April 8, 2005.
  

  After their private meeting today, the members of the Orthodox archbishop's entourage entered the Pope's private library to hear both addresses.
  

  
  

  Related Links:
  

  
  
  • Teresa Polk (Blog by the Sea) provides her translation of the Common Declaration entered into between Pope Benedict XVI and Christodoulos, the Orthodox Archbishop of Athens and all Greece. The original French text was taken from Eucharistie Misricordieuse.
    

  • Also from Teresa, English translations of the The Address of Pope Benedict XVI to His Beatitude Christodoulos and the Address of His Beatitude Christodoulos to Pope Benedict XVI on the occasion of their meeting at the Vatican on December 14, 2006 (from the Vatican's original French).
    

  • East and West - Coverage and discussion at Amy Welborn's Open Book.
    

  • Challenges of Catholic-Orthodox Dialogue Zenit News interviewed Monsignor Dimitrios Salachas, of the Greek-Catholic Apostolic Exarchy of Athens. The monsignor is a professor of canon law in Rome, and consultor for the Congregation for Eastern Churches, the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.
    

In Other News

• On November 3, 2006, Pope Benedict visited the Gregorian University in Rome. You can read the Holy Father's address to students and faculty at the Gregorian here. Fr. James V. Schall used the Pope's visit as inspiration for reflection on What is the Proper Object of Theology? The Pope at the Gregorian Ignatius Insight Nov. 27, 2006.
  

• On December 11, 2006 - Zenit News published the Vatican translation of Benedict's Nov. 7, 2006 address to the Swiss bishops -- the real one, that is.
  

  Back in November the Vatican's press office published a draft intended for John Paul II. It was posted for few hours on the Vatican web page, released in Switzerland by the press office of the Swiss Bishops Conference, and recalled later in the day without comment. (Source: Catholic News Agency; see also Sandro Magister's behind-the-scenes expose: "This Is the Vatican. Communications Have Been Interrupted" Nov. 23, 2006).
  

  Amy Welborn takes a look at the real thing in "Popespeak" (Open Book Dec. 12, 2006).
  

• BustedHalo.com interviews David Gibson on the papacy. Gibson, author of The Rule of Benedict: Pope Benedict XVI and his Clash with the Modern World, spoke of his experiences covering the conclave for Vatican Radio and squaring the public persona and private character of Pope Benedict XVI ("Joseph Ratzinger does not change. I mean basically the short answer is: same guy, different job").
  

  Fair warning to readers, Gibson is admittedly disappointed in some (most?) of Benedict's decisions (the firing of America editor Tom Reese and Ratzinger's career as Prefect for the CDF, which Gibson describes in his book as leaving behind a "legacy of sharp denunciations, thwarted careers, and embittered souls that seems to belie any claims he might make to promoting the love of Christ"). And there are comments in the interview itself that would make many readers of this blog wince:

  "Benedict is wonderful in his Christology and in talking about his love of Christ and why we should follow Jesus. But the question that remains unanswered is why we should remain Catholics, why the Catholic Church should be the container for our faith. His ecclesiology and his Christology overlap so much that they almost can't be separated. In his mind, if you talk about reforming the church or making any changes, you're talking about changing Jesus Christ himself, and that's a little too strict for me."

  Ouch. For a more substantial understanding of Benedict, I would probably recommend God's Choice: Pope Benedict XVI and the Future of the Catholic Church, by JPII papal biographer George Weigel.
  

  The Rule of Benedict was plugged by Whispers in the Loggia's Rocco Palmo, who confesses that he "was involved on the project as a consigliere to the author, a longtime friend and co-conspirator" who picked out the cover.
  

  Gibson's book was praised by the National Catholic Reporter and received largely positive reviews by Commonweal (The Puzzling Pope Andrew M. Greeley. Volume CXXXIII, Number 19) and America magazine ("Facing a Fragmented Church", by Paul Wilkes. America Vol. 195 No. 10), while Indiana Catholic author Andrew Fink found that Gibson's "liberal agenda marred his papal biography.
  

• Ratzinger on Ecumenism: A Reading List - "I was asked by an Orthodox priest if I could provide him some references for Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger's writings about ecumenism," says Carl Olson (Insight Scoop). "In light of the Holy Father's current trip to Turkey, here is the list I came up with. It is undoubtedly incomplete, but may be helpful for those interested in reading more in this area."
  

• Habemus Papam. Twenty Months Later, a Portrait, by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa. December 12, 2006:

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

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

  At the Angelus, two times out of three pope Joseph Ratzinger explains the Gospel of that Sundays Mass to an audience that includes people who dont go to church every week and some who dont go at all. He explains this with simple words, but these demand and receive attention. . . .

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

  
  
• On November 20, 2006 the United Nations' Headquarters hosted a conference on "Relativism and the Crisis of Cultures in the writings of Pope Benedict XVI," to promote the book Christianity and the Crisis of Cultures, published by Ignatius Press. The event was sponsored by the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations, the Path to Peace Foundation, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Ignatius Press, Edizioni Cantagalli and the Sublacense Life and Family Foundation. According to the conference website, the event was attended by "over 180 Ambassadors, Attachs and Delegates, Representatives of NGOs and others."
  

  The conference featured a panel discussion with Marcello Pera (co-author of ), George Weigel,
  

  
  - Welcome by Archbishop Celestino Migliore
  
  - Remarks by Prof. George Weigel, Senior fellow, Ethics and Public Policy Center, Washington
  
  - Remarks by Marcello Pera Senator of the Italian Republic
  

  
  

On a Lighter Note

• Benedict the unlikely pin-up pope, by Patrick Jackson. BBC News. Dec. 17, 2006:

  "Benedict XVI, the shy former disciple of that most media-friendly of popes, John Paul II, has entered an area of the mass communications market that his predecessor apparently never tapped."

  
  
• Pope Benedict XVI, in the first full year of his papacy, was far and away the editors' choice as newsmaker of the year. The poll was the 45th annual survey of Catholic News Service client newspapers. [Catholic News Service Dec. 15, 2006].
  

• One of the pleasures of visiting The American Papist is his ongoing "Papist Picture of the Day", complete with amusing captions. Among the recent treasures: "Having proven his diplomatic skills in Turkey, it was time for Pope Benedict to meet the emissary from planet Vorticon 6" [and] "The washing of the hands is always a dangerous affair when you've got a Pontiff this hot". =)
  

Pope Benedict XVI waves to the faithful at the end of the First Vespers Mass at the Basilica of St. Paul at the Vatican City December 2, 2006.

• Teresa Polk's coverage of Benedict's December 17 Angelus reflection on The True Meaning of Joy at Christmas and
  
• roundup of Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa's Advent Sermons.
  

What follows is a (by no means comprehensive) roundup noting some of the significant events in the Holy Father's pontificate from January-2007 to the present. Apologies for not getting around to this sooner (I'd given up blogging for the most part during Lent).

In the News

Sacramentum Caritatis

Interviews (Q&A with the Pontiff)

Key Addresses

Articles & Commentary on Pope Benedict

On a Lighter Note . . .

• January 4, 2007 - Pope: true joy comes from Gods love and is not that extolled in adverts (AsiaNews.it):

  In his first visit outside the Vatican of 2007, Benedict XVI today went to a Caritas soup kitchen in the Colle Oppio neighbourhood not far from Termini station, described by the pope as a symbol, somehow, of the Roman Caritas. The soup kitchen of Colle Oppio is the first reception centre for homeless people set up in Rome. (Photos of Benedict XVI's visit to the Colle Oppio soup kitchen, courtesy of Argent by the Tiber; Vatican translation of Benedict XVI's address at the soup kitchen, courtesy of ZENIT):

  The Christmas message is simple: God came among us because he loves us and expects our love. God is love: not a sentimental love, but a love that became a total gift to the point of the sacrifice on the Cross, starting from his birth in the grotto in Bethlehem.
  

  The beautiful crib that you have chosen to set up in your Soup Kitchen and which I have just had the opportunity to admire, speaks to us of this real and divine love. In its simplicity, the crib tells us that love and poverty go together . . .

  
  

  In mid-January, Stanislaw Wielgus, the newly-installed Bishop of Warsaw, caused an ecclesial scandal after revelations broke that he had collaborated with the Communist secret police in Poland. The news came as a bitter disappointment to Benedict, who accepted his subsequent resignation. (Source: Zenit News, Jan. 7, 2007).
  

  On February 12th, Benedict XVI expressed his closeness and fraternity to Archbishop Stanislaw Wielgus in a letter he sent to the prelate after his resignation, in which he stated:

  In this last period I have shared in your sufferings and wish to assure you of my spiritual closeness and fraternal understanding. . . .

  When you presented your resignation a month ago, aware that the situation created did not allow you to begin the episcopal service with the indispensable authority, I saw clearly in this act a profound sensitivity for the good of the Church of Warsaw and of Poland, and also your humility and detachment from offices.
  

  Above all I would like to encourage you to continue with confidence and serenity in your heart. I express the desire that you resume your activity at the service of Christ, in the way that is possible, so that you use your vast and profound knowledge and priestly devotion for the good of the beloved Church in Poland.
  

  Today, as in the past, the episcopal mission is marked by suffering. May Our Lord sustain you with his grace.

  The Bishops of Poland had designated Ash Wednesday aday of prayer and repentance for Polish clergy.

  
  

  Related Commentary:

  
  

  
  
  • "Not Up to Us to Judge a Man, a Brother, Who Has Served the Church" (January 14, 2007) - translation of the statement released by the Polish bishops' conference after the resignation of Archbishop Wielgus of Warsaw.
    
    
  • The Wielgus Case: The Reasons for His Resignation, by Sandro Magister. January 11. 2007. www.Chiesa.
    
  • Lessons from an Archbishops Fall, by George Weigel: "To take control of its own history, the Catholic Church in Poland needs to vet miles of communist-era police records." (Newsweek MSNBC January 8, 2007).
    
  
  

• Religious freedom and ecumenism remains a furvent concern for Pope Benedict. On January 19, Benedict asked the Turkish government to grant religious freedom to all believers, and to legally recognize the Catholic Church. .
  On January 22nd, Benedict encouraged dialogue between Orthodox and Muslim communities in Montenegro, while receiving the country's first ambassador to the Holy See.
  
  In his Wednesday January 24 general audience, he surveyed the most significant ecumenical events that took place in 2006.
  

  And on March 28, 2007, Benedict expressed words of appreciation for the work done in ecumenism by the Lutheran World Federation, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of its foundation.
  

  Further Commentary

  
  

  
  
  • The Ecumenical Adventure" - Interview with Father Massa, executive director of the U.S. episcopal conference's Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs. Zenit News. February 23, 2007: "Ecumenical and interreligious dialogue doesn't mean that Catholics have to compromise their beliefs, actually, quite the opposite is true."
    
  
  

• Ratzinger and Aquinas Much is made of then-Cardinal Ratzinger's preference for Augustine over Aquinas, as in when he admitted in Milestones that "I had difficulties in penetrating the thought of Thomas Aquinas, whose crystal-clear logic seemed to be too closed in on itself, too impersonal and ready-made."
  

  Although Ratzinger attributed his negative impression not so much to the good doctor himself as having been presented with "a rigid, neoscholastic Thomism that was simply too far afield from my own questions," it hardly restrains his critics from using it as a cudgel to his head, as when the SSPX publication The Angelus berated him ("The Memories of a Destructive Mind" March 1999 No. 31):

  "This opinion is enunciated by a prince of the Church whose function it is to safeguard the purity of the doctrine of the Faith! Why, then, should anyone be surprised at the current disastrous crisis of Catholicism!"

  
  Perhaps it will ease the concerns of such critics to note that in his January 28 Angelus, Pope Benedict paid tribute to the great Doctor of the Church:

  When Christian faith is authentic, it does not diminish freedom and human reason; so, why should faith and reason fear one another if the best way for them to express themselves is by meeting and entering into dialogue? Faith presupposes reason and perfects it, and reason, enlightened by faith, finds the strength to rise to knowledge of God and spiritual realities. Human reason loses nothing by opening itself to the content of faith, which, indeed, requires its free and conscious adherence.
  

  St Thomas Aquinas, with farsighted wisdom, succeeded in establishing a fruitful confrontation with the Arab and Hebrew thought of his time, to the point that he was considered an ever up-to-date teacher of dialogue with other cultures and religions. He knew how to present that wonderful Christian synthesis of reason and faith which today too, for the Western civilization, is a precious patrimony to draw from for an effective dialogue with the great cultural and religious traditions of the East and South of the world.
  

  Let us pray that Christians, especially those who work in an academic and cultural context, are able to express the reasonableness of their faith and witness to it in a dialogue inspired by love. Let us ask the Lord for this gift through the intercession of St Thomas Aquinas and above all, through Mary, Seat of Wisdom.

  
  

  See also: Benedict on Aquinas: "Faith Implies Reason" Part I | Part II Ignatius Insight, by Fr. James V. Schall, S.J. | February 1, 2007.
  

• On February 14th, 2007, Benedict XVI dedicated his Wednesday general audience address to "Women of the Early Church", affirming that "the female presence in the sphere of the primitive Church was [in no way] secondary." The Pope examines the testimony of St. Paul on the contribution of women in the early Church. The Pope had dedicated his prior Wednesday audience to the role of Aquila and Priscilla, a married couple active in the early Church.
  

• On March 2nd, Pope Benedict gave a tribute to Pope Paul VI - "A Firm and Wise Helmsman of the Barque of Peter":

  In thinking back over the years of his Pontificate, it is striking to note the missionary zeal that motivated him and impelled him to undertake demanding Apostolic Journeys even to distant nations in order to make prophetic gestures of great ecclesial, missionary and ecumenical importance.
  

  He was the first Pope to go to the Land where Christ lived and from which Peter set out on his journey to Rome. That Visit, only six months after his election as Supreme Pastor of the People of God and while the Second Vatican Council was underway, had a clear symbolic meaning. He showed the Church that the path of her mission is to follow in the footsteps of Christ.
  

  This was precisely what Pope Paul VI sought to do during his Petrine ministry, which he always exercised with wisdom and prudence in complete fidelity to the Lord's command.

  
  

• Praying with the Pope. On Saturday, Pope Benedict gathered with European and Asian university students, both in reality and virtually, to pray the rosary. The event was held to mark the fifth European Day for Universities. Amy Welborn (Open Book rounds up coverage of the event, including video footage on YouTube.com.
  

• At the Holy Thursday Chrism Mass, Pope Benedict used a story from Leo Tolstoy to explain the Incarnation of Jesus Christ (Zenit. April 5, 2007):

  Leo Tolstoi, the Russian writer, tells in a short story of a harsh sovereign who asked his priests and sages to show him God so that he might see him. The wise men were unable to satisfy his desire.

  Then a shepherd, who was just coming in from the fields, volunteered to take on the task of the priests and sages. From him the king learned that his eyes were not good enough to see God. Then, however, he wanted to know at least what God does. "To be able to answer your question", the shepherd said to the king, "we must exchange our clothes".
  

  Somewhat hesitant but impelled by curiosity about the information he was expecting, the king consented; he gave the shepherd his royal robes and had himself dressed in the simple clothes of the poor man.

  Then came the answer: "This is what God does".

  
  
• Pope Set to Make Mark on U.S. Church, by Eric Gorski. ABC News. April 12, 2002. "Two years into his reign, Pope Benedict XVI is finally poised to make a major mark on American Catholicism with a string of key bishop appointments and important decisions about the future of U.S. seminaries and bishops' involvement in politics. . . ."

  
  

Sacramentum Caritatis

On March 13, 2007, Benedict XVI released his second major document -- Sacramentum Caritatis (Sacrament of Charity) -- an apostolic exhortation that reflects the conclusions of the 2005 synod on the Eucharist:

The document, dated Feb. 22, reflects the conclusions of the 11th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops held in Rome from Oct. 2 to 23, 2005.

Cardinal Scola, who was the relator general of the synodal assembly, said the title of the apostolic exhortation reaffirms "the Holy Father's insistence over these two years of his pontificate on the truth of love."

The cardinal said that this clearly indicates that this is "one of the crucial themes upon which the future of the Church and of humanity depend."

Text and Commentary

• Sacramentum Caritatis: Post Synodal Apostolic Exhortation on the Eucharist as the Source and Summit of the Church's Life and Mission February 22, 2007.
  
• A Look at "Sacramentum Caritatis" (Interview With Cardinal Angelo Scola) Zenit News. March 15, 2007.
  
• The Exhortations of "Sacramentum Caritatis" (Interview With Archbishop Nicola Eterovic) March 16, 2007.
  
• "Sacramentum Caritatis" a New Step, Aide Says March 18, 2007.
  
• "Sacramentum Caritatis" and Liturgical Beauty - Interview with Father McNamara, a professor of liturgy at the Regina Apostolorum university in Rome. March 19, 2007.
  
• The Key to "Sacramentum Caritatis" - Interview with Father Nicola Bux, author of Il Signore dei Misteri: Eucaristia e Relativismo [The Lord of the Mysteries: Eucharist and Relativism].
  
• Sacramentum Caritatis: Everyone to Mass on Sunday www.Chiesa. March 14, 2007. - Sandro Magister offers "a humble set of crib notes on the many questions that Benedict XVI addresses or touches upon, page by page, in his apostolic exhortation."
  
• Bill Cork notes some odd coverage of the apostolic exhortation; Off the Record's Diogenes observes:

  What's the most important aspect of the Pope's new apostolic exhortation? A quick Google search brought up 8 different newspaper headlines that gave top billing to the Pope's insistence that Catholic politicians must oppose same-sex marriage.

  That topic is not mentioned once in the text of the Sacramentum Caritatis.
  

  Somebody is obsessed with issues of sexuality, and it isn't the Pope.

  
  

Interviews

• On February 17th, 2007 Pope Benedict participated in a Q&A session with seminarians of the Roman Major Seminary. The Holy Father spoke of the discernment of God's voice and spiritual direction ("through his Word, in Sacred Scripture, read in the communion of the Church and read personally in conversation with God"); elements of his own priestly formation and his influences ("it was above all the figure of St Augustine who fascinated me from the very start, then also the Augustinian current in the Middle Ages: St Bonaventure, the great Franciscans, the figure of St Francis of Assisi").
  

  There is a simplicity and beauty in the Holy Father's words and advice, for instance, in persisting in one's vocation despite our very human frailness and inconsistency:

  It is good to recognize one's weakness because in this way we know that we stand in need of the Lord's grace. The Lord comforts us. In the Apostolic College there was not only Judas but also the good Apostles; yet, Peter fell and many times the Lord reprimanded the Apostles for their slowness, the closure of their hearts and their scant faith. He therefore simply shows us that none of us is equal to this great yes, equal to celebrating "in persona Christi", to living coherently in this context, to being united to Christ in his priestly mission.
  

  To console us, the Lord has also given us these parables of the net with the good fish and the bad fish, of the field where wheat but also tares grow. He makes us realize that he came precisely to help us in our weakness, and that he did not come, as he says, to call the just, those who claim they are righteous through and through and are not in need of grace, those who pray praising themselves; but he came to call those who know they are lacking, to provoke those who know they need the Lord's forgiveness every day, that they need his grace in order to progress.
  

  I think this is very important: to recognize that we need an ongoing conversion, that we are simply not there yet. St Augustine, at the moment of his conversion, thought he had reached the heights of life with God, of the beauty of the sun that is his Word. He then had to understand that the journey after conversion is still a journey of conversion, that it remains a journey where the broad perspectives, joys and lights of the Lord are not absent; but nor are dark valleys absent through which we must wend our way with trust, relying on the goodness of the Lord.

  
  On bearing witness to Christ in suffering:

  It was not by chance that the Lord told his disciples: the Son of Man must go to Jerusalem to suffer; therefore, anyone who wants to be a disciple of mine must shoulder his cross so he can follow me. In fact, we are always somewhat similar to Peter, who said to the Lord: "No, Lord, this cannot happen to you, you must not suffer". We do not want to carry the Cross, we want to create a kingdom that is more human, more beautiful, on this earth.
  

  This is totally mistaken: the Lord teaches it. However, Peter needed a lot of time, perhaps his entire life, in order to understand it; why is there this legend of the Quo Vadis? There is something true in it: learning that it is precisely in walking with the Lord's Cross that the journey will bear fruit. Thus, I would say that before talking to others, we ourselves must understand the mystery of the Cross.
  

  Of course, Christianity gives us joy, for love gives joy. But love is also always a process of losing oneself, hence, a process of coming out of oneself; in this regard, it is also a painful process. Only in this way is it beautiful and helps us to mature and to attain true joy.
  

  Anyone who seeks to affirm or to promise a life that is only happy and easy is a liar, because this is not the truth about man; the result is that one then has to flee to false paradises. And in this way one does not attain joy but self-destruction.
  

  Christianity proclaims joy to us, indeed; this joy, however, only develops on the path of love, and this path of love has to do with the Cross, with communion with the Crucified Christ. And it is presented through the grain of wheat that fell to the ground. When we begin to understand and accept this -- every day, because every day brings some disappointment or other, some burden that may also cause pain --, when we accept this lesson of following Christ, just as the Apostles had to learn at this school, so we too will become capable of helping the suffering.

  
  Zenit News provided a translation of the exchange: Part I: "We Must Accept Our Frailty But Keep On Going"; Part II: "A Day Without the Eucharist Is Incomplete". March 2, 2007.
  

• On February 22, Pope Benedict met with the Roman Clergy for a session of questions-and-answers as well. Here is a three part translation, also courtesy of Zenit: Part I: "Contemplation Is Expressed in Works of Charity"; Part II: "Do Not Extinguish Charisms ... the Church Is One" and Part III: "The Pastor Leads the Way" -- which touches on the meaning of reparation in Eucharistic adoration.
  

Key Addresses January - April 2007

• Message of Benedict XVI for the Celebration of the World Day of Peace January 1, 2007.
  

  Commentary
  

  
  Benedict XVI on the Path to Peace (Part 1); Part II - interview with Paolo Carozza, law professor at the University of Notre Dame and a member of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. (Zenit News January 8, 2007):

  Where Benedict XVI goes much further than the prevailing mentality is in his insistence that it is not enough to simply assert -- however correctly -- the link between peace and human dignity. To make that connection real and concrete, not just an abstract ideal or intuition of the truth, one needs to cultivate an adequate and objective understanding of what the human person is, and what human dignity requires.
  

  Benedict XVI thus takes us back to what Mary Ann Glendon has referred to as the "unfinished business" of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: the question of its foundations. For 60 years the international community has largely proceeded to try to develop and realize human rights though positive law while prescinding from any sustained effort to reach common understandings of their underlying source and scope.
  

  In short, the difference between the vision in Benedict XVI's message and the conventional wisdom of international affairs is not so much in the affirmation that the dignity and rights of the human person are the path to peace, but rather in the Pope's warning that that path will be uncertain, unstable and wayward without a "true integral humanism" that embraces the whole human person as a concrete, given reality -- without reduction, without manipulation, and without ideology.

  
  
  
  
• Pope's 2007 Address to the Diplomatic Corps on the State of the World Delivered in the Vatican Apostolic Palace to members of the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See. January 8, 2007.
  
• Pope's Homily on Feast of Baptism of the Lord Zenit News Service. January 15, 2007.
  
• Message of His Holiness Benedict XVI for Lent 2007
  
• Easter Vigil - Homily of His Holiness Benedict XVI April 7, 2007.
  

  Commentary
  

  • "Dying so as to rise . . ." - commentary on the Pope's Easter homily from the blog Wheat and Weeds
  
  

• Urbi Et Orbi - Message of His Holiness Benedict XVI. Easter Sunday April 8, 2007.
  

  Commentary

  
  
  • Explaining Benedict's focus on Africa, by John Allen, Jr. National Catholic Reporter April 9, 2007:

    Benedict XVI, this most European of popes, once again exhibited a notable concern with Africa during the Easter season. In his traditional urbi et orbi greeting, Benedict spoke in greater detail about the political and humanitarian struggles of Africa than any other part of the world. . . .

    
    
  • On Easter, pope laments wars, horrors, 'continual slaughter' in Iraq, by Carol Glatz. Catholic News Service. April 9, 2007.
    

  • Out of Pope Benedict XVI's 1,444 word Urbi Et Orbi Easter Message for 2007 devoted to an observation of all manner of human suffering throughout the world and the response of the Gospel, much is being made of the following sentence:

    In the Middle East, besides some signs of hope in the dialogue between Israel and the Palestinian authority, nothing positive comes from Iraq, torn apart by continual slaughter as the civil population flees.

    Amy Welborn has a roundup of pundit's reactions to the Pope's remark (along with the usual raging debate in the combox); for further commentary and reflections on the reaction, and the attempt by some to decipher a critique of U.S. foreign policy from the Pope's words, click here.
    
  
  

Articles & Commentary

• Exercises in Disinformation: The Pope According to the Leading Newspapers January 5, 2007 - Sandro Magister and Anton Smitsendonk, the former Dutch ambassador to China, examine how the press (including the New York Times and other major newspapers) "deformed Benedict XVIs position on the entry of Turkey into the European Union."
  

• Lost in translation: Pope's asides might be changed in official texts, by John Thavis. Catholic News Service. February 2, 2007:

  Rarely is a general audience talk interrupted by spontaneous applause, and Pope Benedict XVI seemed as surprised as anyone when the clapping began in the Vatican's audience hall.
  

  The pope had been talking about the church's early times, and he set aside his text to drive home a point: The apostles and first disciples weren't perfect, but had their own arguments and controversies.
  

  "This appears very consoling to me, because we see that the saints did not drop as saints from heaven. They were men like us with problems and even with sins," he said Jan. 31.
  

  That's when the applause erupted among the 6,000 people in attendance. The pope paused, looked up and smiled awkwardly, then continued to ad lib about how holiness doesn't mean never making a mistake.
  

  The moment marked a milestone for Pope Benedict as a communicator and demonstrated two important facts: First, the scholarly pontiff is focusing on uncomplicated lessons about the church and the faith. Second, when he talks, people listen.

  
  
• McBrien: B16 doesn't really understand Vatican II, by Carl Olson. Insight Scoop February 4, 2007:

  Fr. Richard McBrien, former consultant to The Da Vinci Code movie and former head of the theology department at Notre Dame, has it on good authorityhis own!that Cardinal Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI doesn't really understand Vatican II or how to correctly interpret it. . . .

  
  

• The "most hyperbolic journalism ever" award goes to Nick Pisa, who makes no attempt to conceal his anti-papal bias in penning 'Hell exists - deny it and you'll end up there'. The Scotsman March 27, 2007:

  POPE BENEDICT XVI has reiterated the existence of Hell and condemned society for not talking about eternal damnation enough.
  

  A furious Pope Benedict unleashed a bitter attack during a sermon while on a visit to a parish church and said: "Hell exists and there is eternal punishment for those who sin and do not repent."
  

  Sounding "more of a parish priest than a Pope" the leader of the world's one billion Roman Catholics added: "The problem today is society does not talk about Hell. It's as if it did not exist, but it does."
  

  Pope Benedict unleashed his fury during a visit to the tiny parish church of St Felicity and the Martyr Children at Fidene on the outskirts of Rome, in his capacity as bishop of the Italian capital.
  

  One churchgoer said: "The Holy Father was really having a go. It was a typical fire-and-brimstone sermon that you would have expected from a parish priest years ago."

  Zenit News' reporting of the homily is a tad more . . . restrained:

  Hell consists in closing oneself off from the love of God, and sin is the true enemy of the human person, Benedict XVI says.
  

  The Pope made that comment on Sunday when celebrating Mass at the Parish of St. Felicity and Martyred Sons in the northern sector of the Diocese of Rome.
  

  "If it is true that God is justice, then we should not forget that he is above all love; if he hates sin it is because he has an infinite love for all human beings," the Holy Father explained.

  
  
• Pope's Study of Church Fathers Not Just for Catholics Zenit. March 28, 2007 - Benedict XVI's Wednesday-audience series on the Apostolic Fathers can give us hope for unity among Christians, says David Warner, a Catholic theologian who was once an evangelical Protestant minister and who is now a senior fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology in Steubenville, Ohio.
  

• "Catholic politicians get strict orders from pope", observes Ian Fisher (International Herald Tribune March 13, 2007):

  Pope Benedict XVI strongly reasserted Tuesday the church's opposition to abortion, euthanasia and gay marriage, saying that Catholic politicians were "especially" obligated to defend the church's stance in their public duties.
  

  "These values are non-negotiable," the pope wrote in a 130-page "apostolic exhortation" issued in Rome, forming a distillation of opinion from a worldwide meeting of bishops at the Vatican in 2005. . . .

  In the document, the pope also repeated that celibacy remains "obligatory" for Catholic priests.

  So sorry to disappoint.
  

• Scott Hahn on Benedict XVI's "Curriculum" Zenit News. March 29, 2007:

  Seminarians, students and other eager listeners gathered recently at the University of the Holy Cross in Rome listen to American professor Scott Hahn expound the theological vision of Benedict XVI. . . .
  

  Foremost on Hahn's agenda was the Holy Father's "curriculum" for Catholics, which Hahn believes will also lead many Protestant theologians to discover the answers they have been searching in the Catholic liturgy.
  

  But even more, Hahn said that Benedict XVI's "clarity and classic style of theologizing" make his teaching accessible to the average lay person.
  

  "One of the remarkable things about Benedict XVI," said Hahn, "is that he is almost too straightforward. With a little bit of effort, those who are not schooled in theology will grasp treasures of biblical wisdom in the context of liturgy and the sacraments."

  
  
• An Apostate from Itself: The Lost Europe of Pope Benedict - From Sandro Magister, "LEuropa nella crisi delle culture" -- an address given by then-Cardinal Ratzinger before the plenary assembly of the European parliament. April 1, 2004.
  

• The Pope and Islam, by Jane Cramer. The New Yorker April 2, 2007.

  It is well known that Benedict wants to transform the Church of Rome, which is not to say that he wants to make it more responsive to the realities of modern life as it is lived by Catholic women in the West, or by Catholic homosexuals, or even by the millions of desperately poor Catholic families in the Third World who are still waiting for some merciful dispensation on the use of contraception. He wants to purify the Church, to make it more definitively Christian, more observant, obedient, and disciplinedyou could say more like the way he sees Islam. And never mind that he doesnt seem to like much about Islam, or that he has doubts about Islams direction. . . .

  
  
• A Pope Who Gets It, by Micah Halpern. FrontPageMag. April 7, 2007:

  It has been confirmed by the Vatican.
  

  Pope Benedict XVI wrote a letter to the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei on behalf of the fifteen British sailors and marines taken captive by Iran. Writing this letter to Iran's Muslim leader was a very bold move on the part of the world's leading Catholic. . . .

  
  
• On April 10, 2007 Dr. Samuel Gregg delivered an address entitled "The Crisis of Europe: Benedict XVIs Analysis and Solution" as part of the Acton Institute's 2007 Lecture Series. Click the link for audio (mp3). Text will be posted as soon as it becomes available.
  

• "Easter in Rome: The Secret Homilies of the Successor of Peter", by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa. April 11, 2007. Commenting on an ongoing problem in the Vatican of Benedict XVI:

  There is a limit beyond which the words of Benedict XVI do not go. They reach completely only those who listen to them in person, whether present physically or thanks to a live television broadcast. The number of these persons is substantial, more than for any earlier pontificate. The Easter urbi et orbi message and the Way of the Cross on Good Friday were followed by huge crowds and retransmitted in more than forty countries. But even more vast is the number of persons who receive the popes message in an incomplete form or not at all.
  

  Benedict XVI experienced this communications block to an even greater extent in the other celebrations of last Holy Week. . . .
  

  among those present at these Masses, only those who understood Italian were able to listen fruitfully to the popes homilies. The Catholic media outlets that translated and distributed the texts in various countries barely extended the listening area, to a niche audience.
  

  For a pope like Benedict XVI, who has centered his ministry precisely upon the word, this is a serious limitation. The offices in the Roman curia that deal with communications have to this point done nothing new in order to remedy this, at least in part. For example, no one sees to a quick distribution of the popes texts by internet to all the bishops and priests of the world, in the various languages.

  
  

On a Lighter Note . . .

• Stop wearing fur, activists tell Pope Reuters. April 14, 2007:

  Animal rights activists in Italy have asked Pope Benedict to stop wearing fur in a sign of respect for the "sacredness of all living species".

  The Pope, who turns 80 on Monday, has been seen over the past winter donning a red velvet hat trimmed with white ermine fur, known as "camauro".

  (Hat tip: Me Monk, Me Meander).
  

• Monsignorial Chic? Whispers in the Loggia January 16, 2007. "No, it's not April Fools Day -- the inspiration behind Versace's spring collection is someone closer to home than you'd expect . . ."
  

• KFC offers new fish sandwich to Vatican for B16's blessing American Papist February 22, 2007.
  

• German soccer legend Franz Beckenbauer has recommitted himself to his faith on account of an October 2005 Vatican meeting with Pope Benedict XVI and the Pope's 2006 visit to Bavaria. (Source: Catholic World News January 16, 2007 / Evangelical Catholicism).
  

• Artist asked to paint Pope adds gravitas and bit of a twinkle The Times March 17, 2007. On the Holy Father's very first formally-commissioned portrait:

  Michael Noakes must be the only man on earth who can suggest to Gods emissary how he should stand and how high he should raise his hand in blessing.
  

  The British artist found himself in the pontiffs private quarters at the Vatican earlier this year doing just that as he persuaded the Pope to stand still. . . .

  Speaking to The Timesyesterday, he recalled how he had been in Rome last year to unveil a portrait of the Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-OConnor, at a seminary in Rome.
  

  He said: At the end of the unveiling, a young Maltese monsignor stationed in the Vatican came over and said simply, Will you paint the Pope for us?. The invitation was all the more surprising because the last Pope had steadfastedly refused to pose for any portraits.
  

  A year after the initial invitation Noakes was contacted again by the Vatican and a date was set.

  
  

During his May 23, 2007 general audience, Pope Benedict reflected on the highlights of his trip to Brazil, recalling especially his "meeting with the young people, hope not only of the future, but a vital force for the Church and society of today," the canonization of Friar Anthony of St Anne Galvoand, the first native-born Saint of Brazil, and the culmination of the visit, "the inauguration of the Fifth General Conference of the Latin American and Caribbean Bishops' Conferences in the Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida."
In his general audience, Benedict also took the opportunity to correct the record on colonization of Latin America". John Allen, Jr. reports:

In apparent response to criticism of his May 13 speech in Brazil in which the pope asserted Christianity was not an imposition of a foreign culture on indigenous peoples of the New World, Benedict XVI today acknowledged the shadows that accompanied the evangelization of the Latin American continent.

The pope said the sufferings and the injustices inflicted by the colonizers on the indigenous populations, who often saw their fundamental human rights trampled upon, cannot be forgotten.

Last Sunday, in an address to the bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean gathered in Aparecida, Brazil, for their Fifth General Conference, Benedict argued that Christianity was not imposed upon native peoples, but rather it was the fulfillment to which their religious experience pointed.

The Utopia of going back to breathe life into the pre-Columbian religions, separating them from Christ and from the universal Church, would not be a step forward, Benedict said in Aparecida.Indeed, it would be a step back. In reality, it would be a retreat towards a stage in history anchored in the past.

Afterwards, spokespersons for indigenous groups complained that the pope appeared to be denying the troubled history of European colonization. . . .

Benedict clarified his position on the subject as follows:

Certainly, the memory of a glorious past cannot ignore the shadows that accompany the work of evangelization of the Latin American Continent: it is not possible, in fact, to forget the suffering and the injustice inflicted by colonizers on the indigenous populations, whose fundamental human rights were often trampled upon.

But the obligation to recall such unjustifiable crimes - crimes, however, already condemned at the time by missionaries like Bartolom de Las Casas and by theologians like Francisco de Vitoria of the University of Salamanca - must not prevent noting with gratitude the wonderful works accomplished by divine grace among those populations in the course of these centuries.

The Gospel has thus become on the Continent the supporting element of a dynamic synthesis which, with various facets and according to the different nations, nonetheless expresses the identity of the Latin American People.

Today, in the age of globalization, this Catholic identity is still present as the most adequate response, provided that it is animated by a serious spiritual formation and by the principles of the social doctrine of the Church.

• On April 27, the Vatican confirmed that Pope Benedict will visit the United Nations:

  Father Federico Lombardi, the director of the Vatican press office, said that the Holy Father has accepted the invitation that was extended to him by Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, who met with the Pope at the Vatican on April 18.
  

  For now "there is no date or program" for the Pope's trip, Father Lombardi said.

  
  
• On May 29th, 2007, Pope Benedict stressed the call to evangelization to which all Christians are beckoned, urging that every baptized person must become active in the Church's missionary activity:

  This appeal was made in the Pope's message for the 81st World Mission Day, which will be celebrated on Oct. 21 with the theme: "All the Churches for All the World."

  In the text, the Holy Father "invites local Churches on all continents to a joint awareness of the urgent need to relaunch missionary activity to meet the many grave challenges of our time." [. . .]
  

  "Faced with an increasingly secularized culture, which seems to be penetrating Western societies more and more, in light of the crisis of the family, the lack of vocations and a progressively aging clergy," the Pope explained, these ancient Churches "run the risk of closing in on themselves, of looking to the future with reduced hope and of lessening their missionary efforts."
  

  "Yet this is precisely the moment to open trustingly to the providence of God, who never abandons his people and who, through the power of the Holy Spirit, guides them towards the accomplishment of his eternal plan of salvation," the Holy Father said.

  
  
• Continuing his reflections on the early fathers of the Christian Church, Pope Benedict turned his attention to the teachings of Tertullian:

  He started the use of theology in Latin. His work brought decisive benefits which it would be unforgivable to underestimate. His influence covered different areas: linguistically, from the use of language and the recovery of classical culture, to singling out a common "Christian soul" in the world and in the formulation of new proposals of human coexistence. . . .

  His apologetic writings are above all the most famous. They manifest two key intentions: to refute the grave accusations that pagans directed against the new religion; and, more propositional and missionary, to proclaim the Gospel message in dialogue with the culture of the time.

  His writings are important as they also show the practical trends in the Christian community regarding Mary Most Holy, the Sacraments of the Eucharist, Matrimony and Reconciliation, Petrine primacy, prayer.... In a special way, in those times of persecution when Christians seemed to be a lost minority, the Apologist exhorted them to hope, which in his treatises is not simply a virtue in itself, but something that involves every aspect of Christian existence. . . .

  In his famous affirmation according to which our soul "is naturally Christian" (Apologeticus 17: 6), Tertullian evokes the perennial continuity between authentic human values and Christian ones. Also in his other reflection borrowed directly from the Gospel, according to which "the Christian cannot hate, not even his enemies" (cf. Apologeticus 37), is found the unavoidable moral resolve, the choice of faith which proposes "non-violence" as the rule of life. Indeed, no one can escape the dramatic aptness of this teaching, also in light of the heated debate on religions.

  
  
• In an interview with the Catholic newspaper Avvenire, Vatican Secretary of State Cardianal Tarcisio Bertone addressed some controversial issues that occupied the press during Benedict XVI's trip to Brazil Zenit News Service. June 4, 2007:

  Cardinal Bertone: There is nothing scandalous in the fact that the Pontiff's press conference was transcribed in a slightly different version from the original. Even the texts of the Wednesday audiences are sometimes published after an accurate revision.
  

  The Catechism of the Catholic Church, too, in its definitive edition, the "editio typica" of 1997, differs in many points from the first edition published in 1992. Those who read the recent document on limbo of the International Theological Commission can see that the "editio typica" of an encyclical -- in this instance, Pope John Paul II's "Evangelium Vitae" -- presents a different and more precise formulation on a certain point than the version that was originally published.
  

  Q: What can you say about the excommunication of legislators who have approved abortion?
  

  Cardinal Bertone: It seems clear to me that the Pope recalled that it is the responsibility of individual bishops to decide whether and when to excommunicate, that it is a penalty foreseen in the Code of Canon Law, and in this case it is a matter of "ferendae sententiae" [a non-automatic excommunication].
  

  Q: And in regard to the beatification of Archbishop Oscar Romero? Why does the published text not mention the fact that the Pope said he has no doubts that Archbishop Romero merits beatification?
  

  Cardinal Bertone: It is evident that the Pope wants to be very respectful of the work of the Congregation for Saints' Causes, the prefect of which was also present on the Pope's flight.
  

  Q: After this experience, do you think it is likely that there will be other press conferences with the Pope?
  

  Cardinal Bertone: That is for the Pope to decide. But everyone knows that Cardinal Ratzinger never had any fear of the press and he always kindly offered answers to journalists who stopped him on the street.

  
  
• On June 6, 2007, A man leaped over security barricades after the general audience and briefly held on to the popemobile before security guards restrained him.:

  he Pope, in fact, did not seem to notice the activity, as everything happened behind his back as he greeted the people.
  

  The Vatican later clarified that the 27-year-old man, of German nationality, suffers from a mental disability and was not trying to harm the Holy Father, but just wanted to attract attention.
  

  The episode lasted only a few seconds, . . .

  The offender was hospitalized at the Vatican's request to "undergo mandatory treatment in a specialized and protected center."
  

  Liveleak has video footage of the incident, and Father Z has a good post on the new security problems faced by Pope Benedict's popularity (Things are Hopping in Rome What Does Prayer Really Say June 6, 2007). See also Cool under pressure: Papal guards handle many pilgrims discreetly, by John Thavis. Catholic News Service. June 7, 2007, on the variety of papal security from Italian police agents to the Vatican's Swiss Guard to Vatican gendarme corps and even sharpshooters positioned from Vatican rooftops. As one might expect, "the biggest problem facing the pope's 'guardian angels' is distinguishing a real threat from a pilgrim's overexuberance."
  

Excerpts

• Introduction: "The Last Fatima Visionary: My Meetings With Sister Lucia" translation of the Pope's introduction to Cardinal Bertone's book "The Last Fatima Visionary: My Meetings With Sister Lucia" (Rai Eri/Rizzoli). The book was written in collaboration with Giuseppe De Carli.
  

Writings and Commentary about Pope Benedict XVI

• His Own Pope Yet?, by David Gibson. New York Times April 23, 2007:

  By and large, the pontiffs approach has worked. Liberal Catholics were so relieved that Benedict was not issuing daily bulls of excommunication that they took a kind word as a hopeful omen. Indeed, the loudest complaints about Benedicts record have come from his erstwhile allies on the right who are miffed that he has not cracked down hard and fast on those they consider dissenters.
  

  But the Catholic right ought to have more patience, just as the Catholic left and everyone else might want to pay closer attention. The reality is that during these two years, even as he has preached the boundless grace of Christian charity, Benedict has also made it clear that divine love does not allow for compromise on matters of truth as the pope sees it, and that he will not brook anything that smacks of change in church teachings or traditions. Nor is he a caretaker pope who is willing to stand pat.

  Commonweal's J. Peter Nixon disputes Gibson's conclusion that "Benedict is a more conservative pope than his public image suggests".
  

• Charity and Justice in the Relations among People and Nations: The Encyclical Deus Caritas Est of Pope Benedict XVI, by J. Augustine Di Noia, O.P. Undersecretary, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Address to the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences / XIII Plenary Session 27 April 2007.
  

• The Pope and the Pop Star", by Sean Curnyn. First Things "On The Square" May 10, 2007:

  On Saturday, September 27, 1997, during the Twenty-third Eucharistic Congress and as part of pope John Paul IIs pastoral visit to Bologna, there took place an outdoor event attended by some 300,000 people, featuring musical performances by Bob Dylan, in addition to certain Italian pop-musicians. As recounted in his recent book of memoirs, John Paul II, My Beloved Predecessor, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had serious misgivings about having the pope literally and figuratively share a platform with these popular musicians, and with Bob Dylan in particular. . . .

  
  
• Papal youth appeal is about the message as well as the man, by Colleen Carroll Campbell. May 17, 2007:

  . . . it was the sort of pointed, politically incorrect address that makes many pundits cringe. American and European newspaper journalists covering the event reminded their readers that young people may applaud Benedict, but they do not actually pay attention to what he says. The proof in nearly every report was the same: an obligatory quote from a teenage critic who disagrees with Benedict about condom distribution or pre-marital sex.
  

  Benedict's critics have plenty of company. But it seems odd that journalists attending papal youth rallies that attract tens of thousands of cheering young people regularly quote only disgruntled teenagers in their reports. If the pope is a bore and young people find his message irrelevant, why do so many of them flock to hear it? . . .
  

  Benedict has won that admiration not in spite of his message but because of it. While many leaders today regard the young as bundles of hormones incapable of sacrifice or self-restraint, Benedict views them as souls longing for goodness and God. He tells them that the restlessness they feel the persistent longing that no amount of money, power, or pleasure can seem to satisfy is not a curse. It is a reminder that they were created for more than the consumption of goods and satisfaction of appetites. You were created for love, Benedict tells them, the kind of love that finds its fulfillment in service to others.
  

  Benedict's message is as demanding as John Paul's was, and many young people struggle to put it into practice. Yet they are listening.

  
  
• The Pope on Conscience, Reason Washington Times May 20, 2007. A brief review of On Conscience and The Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion (with Jurgen Habermas).
  

• The Pope's Communications Paradox, by John Allen Jr. National Catholic Reporter May 27, 2007:

  This post-Brazil contretemps offers the latest confirmation that as a public figure, Benedict XVI has two qualities which often work at cross-purposes.
  

  Benedict XVI hadn't even stepped off the papal plane at Rome's Ciampino airport on Monday, ending his May 9-13 Brazilian swing, when controversy from the trip caught up with him. Spokespersons for Brazil's indigenous populations were incensed by comments the pope made in Aparecida late Sunday afternoon, asserting that the arrival of Christianity did not amount to "the imposition of a foreign culture" upon the native peoples of the New World. To the natives, that seemed a nasty bit of historical revisionism.
  

  On the one hand, Benedict is an exceptionally lucid communicator. He's a gifted logician, so his conclusions flow naturally from his premises. Moreover, he's able to synthesize complex ideas in easy-to-understand formula, so you don't need a degree in theology to get his point. Yet Benedict can also be remarkably tone-deaf to how his pronouncements may sound to people who don't share his intellectual and cultural premises. . . .

  
  
• The Best Hypothesis: The Humble Proposal of the Church of Ratzinger and Ruini, by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa May 21, 2007. "The same day on which, in Sao Paolo, Brazil, Benedict XVI addressed the key discourse of his trip to the bishops of that nation, in Italy his cardinal vicar Camillo Ruini was laying down the guidelines for a positive encounter of Christianity with the dominant traits of contemporary culture. The day was May 11. And the two discourses, by the pope and by his vicar, in spite of their great geographic distance were in reality very close."
  

• Papal patience causes chafing among some Vatican bureaucrats, media", by John Thavis. Catholic News Service. June 11, 2007:

  VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- More than two years into his pontificate, Pope Benedict XVI has proven to be a very patient decision-maker -- so patient that even some of his Vatican bureaucrats are chafing a little.
  

  "There are all these decisions that you thought were already made, and then nothing happens," one Roman Curia official said in early June.
  

  The examples abound:
  

  -- The pope's letter to Chinese Catholics, announced in January, has yet to appear.
  

  -- The papal document widening use of the Tridentine Mass, reportedly ready since last fall, is still awaiting publication.
  

  -- A consistory to name new cardinals, expected in June by most Vatican officials, has apparently been put off until the fall.
  

  -- A slew of key appointments, including the replacement of several Roman Curia heads who are past retirement age, keep getting deferred.
  

  -- The streamlining of Vatican communications agencies, rumored to have been one of the pope's priorities following his election in 2005, still has not happened.
  

  Why are things taking so long? The main reason, according to those inside the Curia, is that the pope believes some of these questions call for consultation and fine-tuning, rather than snap decisions.

  
  

• The Courage To Be Imperfect - Excerpt from Pope Benedict XVI: The Conscience of Our Age (A Theological Portrait) Ignatius Insight:

  . . . While at Tubingen, one student asked another to identify the difference between Professor Ratzinger and another equally famous theologian. The reply was: Ratzinger also finds time to play the piano. He is as open to beauty as he is to truth. He lives outside himself. He is not preoccupied with his own self. Put simply, he does not take himself too seriously.
  

  The other anecdote is personal. Once he asked me gently about the progress of my thesis. It was about time, as I had been working on it for some seven years. I told him that I thought there was still some work to be done. He turned to me with those piercing but kindly eyes, saying with a smile: "Nur Mut zur Lcke" (Have the courage to leave some gaps). In other words, be courageous enough to be imperfect.
  

  On reflection, this is one of the keys to Ratzinger's character (and also to his theology; in particular his theology of politics): his acceptance that everything we do is imperfect, that all knowledge is limited, no matter how brilliant or well read one may be. It never bothered him that in a course of lectures he rarely covered the actual content of the course. His most famous book, Introduction to Christianity, is incomplete. [8] Ratzinger knows in his heart and soul that God alone is perfect and that all human attempts at perfection (such as political utopias) end in disaster.

  The only perfection open to us is that advocated by Jesus in the Gospel: "You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Mt 5:48), he who "makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust" (Mt 5:45). Love of God and love of neighbor: that is the secret of Pope Benedict XVI, and that will be the core of his universal teaching.

  
  
• Forthcoming: The Apostles (Our Sunday Visitor, August 2007). A compilation of Benedict's general audiences' talks on the apostles.
  

Scholarly Articles

• The subject of the Volume 2, 2006 issue of Letter and Spirit is "The Authority of Mystery: The Word of God and the People of God", in which Dr. Scott Hahn has an article on The Authority of Mystery: The Biblical Theology of Pope Benedict XVI." (See link for ordering info).
  

• Via Carl Olson @ Insight Scoop): The May/June 2007 issue of Saint Austin Review (StAR) focuses on "The Spirit of the Liturgy," and features articles by several Ignatius Press authors, including Fr. Thomas M. Kocik, author of The Reform of the Reform?, Fr. Uwe Michael Lang, author of Turning Towards the Lord, Alcuin Reid, author of The Organic Development of the Liturgy, and, of course, Joseph Pearce, who is co-editor of StAR with Robert Asch.
  

  Two of the articles are available for download, including "A Juggler on a Tightrope: Benedict XVI and the 'Tridentine' Question", by Fr. Kocik. [.pdf format].
  

My trip above all is a pilgrimage. I want to take my place in the long line of pilgrims over the course of 850 years [to Mariazell], a pilgrim among the pilgrims, one who prays among all the others who pray. This sign of unity created by the faith seems important to me. Its unity among peoples, because this is a pilgrimage site for many peoples. Its also unity across time. Therefore, its a symbol of the unifying power that comes with faith, the power of reconciliation. In this sense, its also a symbol of the universality of the community of the faith, of the church, a symbol also of humility, and above all a symbol that we have confidence in God, in the priority of God that God exists, that we need Gods help. Naturally, of course, its also an expression of love for the Madonna. Thus, I simply want to confirm these essential elements of the faith in this moment of its history.

Mariazell

Background to the Marian Shrine at Mariazell:

Mariazell dates back to 1157 when a monk named Magnus from the Benedictine Abbey of St. Lambrecht sought the solitude of the forests and the mountains. He carried with him a carved wooden statue of the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child, twenty-two inches high. When he could go no further, he placed the figure on a branch of a linden tree and built a cell for himself and the holy statue there. This was in the Valley of Cell or the Zellertal.

Magnus soon attracted people, shepherds and hunters, to whom he ministered as their priest. A small village grew around his simple chapel. The carved wooden figure of the Virgin Mary became to be known as a miraculous object of great veneration, with a growing reputation for the signs and wonders which were worked through it.

Around 1200 a Romanesque church replaced the monks humble chapel and cell, and the fame of Our Beloved Lady of Cell (Mariazell) began to spread far and wide. Pilgrims from lands all around began to come to seek the aid and blessings of the Holy Virgin and Child. Venerated by Emperors and Kings, Mariazell attracted not only the nobility of Austria, Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, Bavaria and Slovenia, but simple pilgrims from all classes of society. The church became Magna Mater Austriae (the Great Mother of Austria), with similar titles in neighbouring lands.

About 1340 King Louis the Great of Hungary replaced the Romanesque church with a larger edifice in gratitude for the Virgins help in defeating the Turkish and Bulgarian invaders. The present Baroque church was built in the late 17th century; the interior and high altar being the work of the great Baroque architect, Fischer von Erlach. Von Erlach was born in Austria and spent his first 16 years of training in the workshop of Bernini in Rome. When he returned to Austria, his was a sought after architect that had great influence on the major building works of the day. So great and so appreciated that the Emperor, Joseph I raised him to nobility.

A magnificent silver gate frames the sanctuary in front of the holy statue of the Virgin Mary in the middle of the church and was donated by the Emperor Leopold I (1658-1705). The statue itself, which shows no signs of decay despite its great age, is normally clothed in rich robes reflecting the liturgical colours of the Catholic Church. It continues to attract pilgrims from the lands of Central Europe in their thousands all year round.

Resources / Roundups

• Papal Intinerary
  
• Coverage via The Schonborn Site
  
• Coverage on the Pope Benedict Forum with photographs and background history of the shrine.
  
• Basilika-Mariazell.at - website of the shrine.
  
• Blog by the Sea: Pope Benedict XVI in Austria | Pope Benedict XVI's Words in Austria - roundups & analysis from Catholic blogger Teresa Polk.
  

• Transcript of Remarks by Pope Benedict XVI aboard the Papal Plane Sept. 7, 2007. - Prior to takeoff at roughly 9:30 am Rome time, Pope Benedict XVI spoke with reporters aboard the papal plane to respond to four questions which had been collected in advance by Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesperson. (Courtesy of John Allen Jr.).
  
• Welcome ceremony at the international airport of Vienna/Schwechat (September 7, 2007)
  
• Prayer before the Mariensule at Am Hof Square in Vienna (September 7, 2007)
  
• Meeting with the public authorities and the Diplomatic Corps at Hofburg Palace in Vienna (September 7, 2007) | Sky Video
  
• Holy Mass on the occasion of the 850th anniversary of the foundation of the Shrine of Mariazell (September 8, 2007) | Sky Video
  
• Celebration of Marian Vespers with priests, religious, deacons and seminarians at the Basilica of Mariazell (September 8, 2007)
  
• Holy Mass in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna (September 9, 2007) | Sky Video
  
• Recitation of the Angelus Domini (September 9, 2007)
  
• Visit to Heiligenkreuz Abbey (September 9, 2007)
  
• Meeting with representatives of volonteer organizations at the Wiener Konzerthaus (September 9, 2007)
  
• Farewell ceremony at the international airport of Vienna/Schwechat (September 9, 2007)
  
  

News, Coverage & Commentary

Media [Video / Audio]

• Cardinal Arinze on Papal Voyage to Austria [audio] - Vatican Radio.
  
• Video of Pope's Arrival and Events of Sept. 7, 2007 www.skylife.it
  

Preliminary

• Big business Benedict: pope visit prompts tourist boom EUX.TV Mariazell, Austria:

  Rosaries, pictures, candles, figurines, keyrings and mugs bearing the image of Pope Benedict XVI: The selection at stalls selling souvenirs and devotional objects in front of Mariazell's baroque basilica seems endless.
  

  Dealers in devotional objects at Austria's most important pilgrimage site and main destination of the Holy Father's September 7-9 visit are expecting "significant sales increases".
  

  Jealously guarding their territory, Mariazell's old-established traders banned all hawkers, infamous for their unholy kitsch, from the village.
  

  A papal visit is always connected with big business, be it investments ahead of his arrival, sales during the visit or long term effects generated by his presence, however short, at any given location. . . .
  

  Not content to leave the field to tourism managers and hawkers, Austria's church threw itself into the pope business, cutting sponsoring deals with mobile phone providers and setting up an online shop selling t-shirts, bags, local delicacies or replicas of the Marizaell Madonna for the charitable sum of 1,050 euros.
  

  At Heiligenkreuz abbey, where the pope will spend less than an hour of his busy schedule, the business-minded brethren hope that he will find the time to take a sip of their local wine.
  

  Labelled "as drunk by Pope Benedict XVI", the blessed grape juice should help boost sales of the highly unprofitable abbey vineyards.
  

  "The pope's visit is mainly a spiritual and not a business event. We do not want to make business with the Holy Father or reach economic goals," Heiligenkreuz abbot Gregor Henkel Donnersmarck stressed.

  
  
• Mariazell lacks dazzle, but its simplicity helps its fame in Austria, by John Thavis. Catholic News Agency. August 30, 2007:

  "Mariazell is not a 'spectacular' sanctuary. There are no apparitions or miracles that fill the pages of newspapers," said Benedictine Father Karl Schauer, superior of the sanctuary.
  

  "There is no particular form of religiosity here, and no particular group has taken over this place for itself," he told the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano.

  Then-Cardinal Ratzinger visited Mariazell in 2004, a few months before his election as Pope Benedict XVI. From Rcesq of the Benedict Forum, a translation of the homily preached by then-Cardinal Ratzinger during his October 2004 visit to Mariazell.
  

• Cardinal Schonborn on the Pope in Austria: Part I | Part II - Interview on Benedict XVI's Upcoming Trip. Zenit News. Sept. 6, 2007:

  Q: The Holy Father's visit to Austria is a pilgrimage to Mariazell. What importance does Mary have in the Christian life?
  

  Cardinal Schnborn: The motto "Turn your gaze toward Christ" is deeply inspired by Mariazell. If you look at the "full of grace" statue in Mariazell, the 850-year-old small statue of Linden wood, without festal vestments, without the opulent robes it is usually clothed in, you can see a simple figure of this smiling and mysterious Mother of God, and on her lap a child with an apple in his hand, symbol of the reign of divine power. And Mary is clearly pointing to the baby. That means that she is saying to us what she said at Cana -- "Do whatever he tells you" -- and she teaches us to look to Christ.
  

  She is looking at us but she is pointing to Christ. In a certain sense she is calling to us: "Look there, look at my son." And I think that this is the motto that Pope John Paul II chose for his entire life and especially for his pontificate. "Totus tuus" means to Christ through Mary. She shows us the way. Therefore let us begin Benedict XVI's pilgrimage, and with the Holy Father, to Mariazell, and to the Am Hof Plaza before the Mariensaeule.

  
  
• Criticism and little enthusiasm ahead of Pope visit EUX.tv Sept. 5, 2007:

  what should be a home game for the German-born pope is being met with increasing indifference by Austria's Catholics, according to several polls published in the run-up to Benedict XVI arrival. According to one survey, 82 per cent said the pope's visit was of "little importance" to them. . . .

  Progressive forces in the church are disappointed that a discussion of topics like celibacy or the role of women in the church is unlikely.
  

  In the traditionally strongly catholic country, the church, is losing members fast. A string of scandals over the past ten years drastically reduced the number of church members, 500,000 left the church between 1991 and 2006.
  

  A cardinal being accused of abusing children, a sex scandal involving child porn at a seminary and the appointment of several controversial churchmen to high positions eroded faith and sped up the exodus from the church.

  
  

September 7, 2007

• Benedict expresses sadness, repentance for Holocaust, by John Allen Jr.:

  The Holocaust memorial is located near Viennas Judenplatz, the location of the citys main synagogue. In a driving rain, Benedict stood alongside Chief Rabbi Paul Chaim Eisenberg, as well as the head of the local Jewish community, for several moments of silent prayer. The monument contains the names of 65,000 Austrian Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis between 1938 and 1945.
  

  Its an act with deep local resonance, since Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna supported Austrias union with Nazi Germany in 1938, symbolizing for critics the Catholic Churchs insufficient resistance to Nazi ideology. . . .

  Benedict said aboard the papal plane that he wanted to visit the memorial to the Shoah in order to demonstrate our sadness, our repentance, and also our friendship with our Jewish brothers, in order to move forward with this great union that God has created among his people.
  

  As Benedict pulled away in his popemobile, a member of the Jewish community flashed the pope a peace sign. Benedict responded with a broad smile and a wave.

  
  

  During the visit, Two prominent Austrian Jewish leaders urged Pope Benedict XVI to use his moral authority to stop Iran from developing the ability to produce nuclear weapons and prevent a "catastrophe for all of humanity", according to the Associated Press. "The letter . . . was written in consultation with other Jewish communities in Europe, said Ariel Muzicant, the head of Vienna's Jewish Community. He co-signed the letter with Vienna's chief rabbi, Paul Chaim Eisenberg."
  

• An untold chapter of Benedict's history with the Austrian Church, by John Allen Jr. National Catholic Reporter Sept. 7, 2007:

  Prior to becoming pope, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger apparently played a key role in arguably preventing a bad situation [the sex abuse scandals in Austria] from becoming worse.
  

  When the widely popular Cardinal Franz Knig stepped down as the Archbishop of Vienna in 1985, it was rumored that Pope John Paul IIs personal secretary, Stanislaw Dziwisz, told the Vaticans Congregation for Bishops that the pope had then-Fr. Kurt Krenn in mind as Knigs successor. Krenn, at the time a priest of the Linz diocese, was a personal friend of Dziwisz.
  

  A strong theological and philosophical conservative, Krenn had served on the faculty of the University of Regensburg in Germany. He was seen in Austria as a combative, divisive figure. For example, Krenn once compared dissident Catholics to Nazi sympathizers who had welcomed Hitler in 1938. Many local figures felt that his appointment could split the church following the nearly thirty-year tenure of the moderate, pastoral Knig.
  

  Though it was not revealed at the time, it has since become conventional wisdom that the decisive voice against Krenns appointment came from Ratzinger.

  
  

• Benedict's correction of Paul VI - John Allen Jr. interprets Benedict's statement that Austria is certainly not an enchanted island" as a corrective to Paul VI, who first referred to Austria as an island of the blessed in 1967, providing the background behind the phrase.
  

• Pope Vigorously Defends Catholicism in Austria and Raises Concerns on Europes Future, by Ian Fisher. New York Times September 7, 2007:

  VIENNA, Sept. 7 Pope Benedict XVI confronted Friday the shadows of Europes past, praying at a Holocaust memorial here, as he spoke with worry about its future. Europe, he said, may extinguish itself, in numbers and spirit, if it embraces abortion and rejects Christianity, which he said profoundly shaped the continent.
  

  It should be everyones concern to ensure that the day will never come when only its stones speak of Christianity, the pope said, at the start of a three-day visit here. An Austria without a vibrant Christian faith would no longer be Austria.
  

  But the 80-year-old popes vigorous defense of Catholicism delivered in a slightly hoarse voice because of what the Vatican said was a sore throat may not be, at the moment, a popular stand in Austria.

  
  
• Looking for signs of a 'great awakening' in Austria, by John Allen, Jr. National Catholic Reporter Sept. 7, 2007:

  Pope Benedict XVI grew up in Bavaria, just across the Salzach River from Austria. In his 1997 memoirs Milestones, Joseph Ratzinger wistfully describes joining his family for Sunday walks across a local bridge into Salzburg, falling under the spell of Austrian culture and music. Msgr. Georg Ratzinger, the pope's brother, recently confessed that "both of us are Austria-lovers."
  

  Given that history, Benedict XVI's Sept. 7-9 trip to Austria, his first as pope, ought to be a warm homecoming for a pontiff who is virtually a native son. Yet in some ways, enthusiasm here does not exactly seem infectious. In a recent poll asking Austrians to name their most trusted international figure, Benedict XVI actually trailed both the Dali Lama and the Austrian-born governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Another survey found that only 3 percent of Austrians had any interest in seeing the pope live, and 40 percent planned to "completely ignore" his presence.
  

  The ignominy of finishing behind the Terminator in terms of public trust offers one window onto the challenges awaiting Benedict. The church in Austria today may no longer be seething with anger, as it was for much of the last decade, but neither is it the homogenous Catholic culture of the pope's childhood memory.

  
  

Papal Mass in Mariazell. Sept. 8, 2007. Photo courtesy of Gerald Augustinus Closed Cafeteria

Sept. 8, 2007:

• Thousands join Pope Benedict XVI on Austrian pilgrimage :

  VIENNA (AFP) Tens of thousands of devout Catholics Saturday braved pelting rain and chilly temperatures to join Pope Benedict XVI in a pilgrimage at Austria's historic Mariazell basilica.
  

  Pilgrims waving Polish, Czech or Bavarian flags and others of all ages and races attended the morning mass by the pope in front of the pink and white baroque church. . . .
  

  Many had traveled by bus. Others came by train, but a few walked with rucksacks on their backs, up the mountain to Mariazell, observing their pilgrimage in the traditional way.
  

  American Mary Jo Szekeres, 22, said she had traveled nine hours Friday from Piestany in Slovakia where she works as an English teacher, to attend the mass.
  

  The trip was well worth it, she said. "I feel a more personal connection to the pope now. I've seen him, I've heard him speak." . . .
  

  American theology student Erika Olson, 20, marveled that the pope was visiting Austria just as she was here for a semester.
  

  "When I go back and read his writings, I'll hear his voice from now on," she said.
  

  "I can't feel my feet," she added however with a laugh after standing for hours in the cold.

  
  
• Europe future bleak without God, more children - Pope Reuters. Sept. 8, 2007:

  Benedict, who appeared to be struggling with a hoarse voice, wove his sermon around the theme of revitalising Christian identity in a modern Europe marked by diminishing Church participation, low birthrates and rampant consumerism.
  

  "Europe has become child-poor," he said. "We want everything for ourselves and place little trust in the future."
  

  It was the second time in as many days that the Pope decried Europe's declining birth rates. On Friday he condemned abortion, rejecting the concept that it could be considered a human right, and urged politicians enact legislation to help new families.
  

  The average birth rate in the European Union is down to about 1.5 children per woman, raising fears that an ageing population will not be able to finance pensions systems.

  From Benedict's homily:

  The child Jesus naturally reminds us also of all the children in the world, in whom he wishes to come to us. Children who live in poverty; who are exploited as soldiers; who have never been able to experience the love of parents; sick and suffering children, but also those who are joyful and healthy. Europe has become child-poor: we want everything for ourselves, and place little trust in the future. Yet the earth will be deprived of a future only when the forces of the human heart and of reason illuminated by the heart are extinguished when the face of God no longer shines upon the earth. Where God is, there is the future.

  
  
• Pope defends celibacy and obedience, offers gesture to China, by John Allen, Jr. National Catholic Reporter Sept. 8, 2007:

  . . . Earlier in the day, Benedict XVI signaled that his universal interests havent faded despite being on a virtual homecoming. He laid hands on a replica of the statue of the Madonna of Mariazell that will be presented to the Bishop of Shanghai in China by Cardinal Christoph Schnborn of Vienna. According to Vatican spokesperson Fr. Federico Lombardi, the pope expressed satisfaction that the Catholic Church in China was remembered as part of his Austrian pilgrimage.
  

  The estimated 13 million Catholics in China face a series of restrictions on their religious freedom, and the Chinese government has recently announced plans to ordain new bishops without Vatican approval.
  

  During the vespers service, the pope styled his remarks as reflections upon the three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. . . . [Read More]

  
  

Papal Mass at St. Stephens. Sept. 9, 2007. Photo courtesy of Gerald Augustinus Closed Cafeteria

Sept. 9, 2007:

• Bad weather, muted turnout beset pope as 3-day Austria pilgrimage ends International Herald Tribune Sept. 9, 2007:

  Despite a chilly rainfall, about 15,000 people packed the square outside Vienna's St. Stephen's Cathedral for Sunday's papal Mass, according to official estimates. Another 12,000 cheering pilgrims flocked to an abbey on the outskirts of the capital to see the pope.
  

  But the turnout was low, considering 200,000 Viennese identify themselves as Catholics.
  

  It underscored Benedict's challenge not just in Austria but across an increasingly multicultural Europe, where many believers have become disillusioned and drifted away from the church. . . .
  

  But the atmosphere was festive at Benedict's brief stop at the medieval Heiligenkreuz Abbey just south of Vienna, where pilgrims waved giant foam hands and young former drug addicts sang and danced on an outdoor stage.
  

  "At first I didn't feel like coming, but it was definitely worth it he has an incredibly positive charisma," said Helga Bertoni, among the faithful who packed the abbey's courtyard. . . .
  

  A few weak rays of sunshine poked through as Benedict delivered his weekly Angelus prayer on the plaza, but a gust of wind blew his white skullcap off his head, sending aides scrambling to retrieve it.
  

  "The wind has spoken for itself," the pope joked as more gusts tugged at the crimson mantel around his shoulders and repeatedly flipped it up over his face.

  There is of course some dispute as to the 'low turnout' and the media's apparent need to emphasize such. See also Gerald Augustinus' photography, Tales of the Cape, on Benedict's Battle with the Wind. =)
  

• Pope calls Catholics to charity work; Concluding his Austrian visit, he also tells a Vienna crowd that Sundays should be reserved for God, by Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times Sept. 10, 2007:

  Pope Benedict XVI ended a three-day pilgrimage to Austria on Sunday, telling Catholics to keep Sundays holy and to dedicate themselves to volunteer work to spread "the Christian image of God."
  

  With those themes, Benedict homed in on two aspects of Christian life that Austrians are particularly adept at. Despite disaffection with the once-powerful church here, Austria remains one of Europe's last countries to ban most commercial activity on Sundays, and it is a leading force in social charity work.
  

  After two rain-drenched days, the sun came out Sunday as the pope finished holy Mass at Vienna's landmark St. Stephen's Cathedral, a Gothic and Baroque church that survived heavy damage in World War II bombing. Its distinctive roof in blue, green and gold geometric-patterned tiles dominates the skyline of Old Vienna.
  

  The Mass was filled with the music of Haydn performed by orchestra and chorus and echoing out of doors in the plaza and cobblestone streets, where thousands of faithful gathered and chanted the pope's name.
  

  "Without the Lord and without the day that belongs to him, life does not flourish," the pope said in his homily, seated under the cathedral's gilded 17th century high altar.
  

  Western societies, he complained, have turned Sundays into part of a weekend of leisure. Leisure is necessary, he said, "especially amid the mad rush of the modern world."
  

  But without an "encounter" with God, he said, Sunday "becomes wasted time that neither strengthens nor builds us up."

  
  
• Pope Tells Children They Are His "Co-Workers" Zenit News Service. Sept. 9, 2007:

  Benedict XVI took up pen and paper to assure the children of Austria's Pontifical Mission Societies that he sees them as true co-workers.
  

  After reciting the Angelus today in Vienna's St. Stephen's Square, the Pope paused to greet a group of children from "Missio," who gave him letters and drawings to welcome him to Austria.
  

  Benedict XVI wrote a letter of gratitude to the children, delivered to the institute's national director, Father Leo Maasburg.
  

  The Pope said: "I see in you little co-workers in the service that the Pope gives to the Church and he world: You support me with your prayer and with your commitment to spread the Gospel.
  

  "There are in fact many children who still do not know Jesus. And unfortunately there are as many others who do not have the necessities to live: food, medical care, education; many do not have peace and serenity.
  

  "The Church gives them particular attention, especially through missionaries; and you too feel called to offer your contribution, whether personally or as a group."
  

  The Pontiff added: "Friendship with Jesus is such a beautiful gift that you cannot keep it to yourselves! Those who receive this gift feel the need to give it to others; and in this way the shared gift does not diminish but multiplies! Keep to this path!"

  
  
• On Sept. 9th, Benedict visited the Cistertian Abbey of Heiligenkreuz. According to the Abbey's website, Cardinal Ratzinger has visited the abbey "often," both privately and in official capacity. Following is a translation (credit: Rcesq / Benodette of the Benedict Forum) of one of Ratzinger's visits:

  For one of [Cardinal Ratzinger's] visits our students prepared a musical welcome to the university for him. The photograph is from May 4, 1989.
  

  Then the Dean Professor Fr. Dr. Augustinus Fenz greeted the Prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith with a two-page Latin address. Cardinal Ratzinger answered off-the-cuff likewise in Latin. He said, among other things: "... vitam present magna consolatio est hic invenisse insulam culturae latinae... audivisse scholares et non solum frequenter cursus venire, set etiam into hac valle nemorosa non solum pulchritudine naturali sed etiam pulchritudine vitae spiritualis ornata studiis incumbere. Omnia fausta tibi et huic illustri facultati ex corde exoptamus." Translation: Your way of life here is for me a great comfort, and I am happy to find here an island of the culture of the Latin language. I am happy to hear that the students also attend lectures daily, and that in these Vienna woods not only the beauty of nature is to be admired, but also the beauty of your spiritual life. From my heart I wish you and your illustrious university a thriving prosperity.
  

  Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger in 1985 in Eisenstadt at a lecture for priests. On the right one sees Fr. Gregor Henckel Donnersmarck, now Lord Abbott; on the left is Fr. Karl Wallner, now the Rector of the Papal University Benedict XVI, Heiligenkreuz.

  One of the reasons why the Holy Father wanted to come to Heiligenkreuz, is probably also the elevation to papal university, which took place on January 28, 2007, of the university that was established in 1802. The university has already existed for 205 years, but it has never flourished before as it does now: at present 160 are studying here; more than 100 are on the way to the priesthood. The elevation means the independence of the university. In the future the degree of Master of theology can be achieved in Heiligenkreuz directly and not, like before, by the detour of the University of Vienna. . . .
  

  It was the personal wish of Abbot Gregor, who always admired the theologian Joseph Ratzinger, that for the future the papal university would bear the name: Papal Philosophical-Theological University Benedict XVI, Heiligenkreuz. The Holy Father is indeed truly irrespective of his office one of the greatest intellectuals of the present day. . . .
  

  We Cistercians of the Heiligenkreuz Abbey are a little astonished at the horn of plenty that was poured out over us in 2007: a boom of young, good vocations, then the elevation from university to papal university, and then the Oscar [Academy Award] for Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, who wrote the script [The Lives of Others] here and now as high point the Holy Fathers visit in 2007.

  
  
• Finally, photos of "One Happy Swiss Guard", bidding the Holy Father goodbye as he departs from Heiligenkreuz. A special congratulations and note of appreciation to Gerald Augustinus, whose photographs from this event rival anything produced by the "mainstream media."
  

• 12/01/07 - In his December 2nd Angelus, Benedict took the opportunity to summarize his second encyclical, Spe Salvi ("Saved in Hope"):

  [In Romans 8:24] . . . the word hope is closely connected with the word faith. It is a gift that changes the life of those who receive it, as the experience of so many saints demonstrates. In what does this hope consist that is so great and so trustworthy as to make us say that in it we have salvation?
  

  In substance it consists in the knowledge of God, in the discovery of his heart as a good and merciful Father. Jesus, with his death on the cross and his resurrection, has revealed to us his countenance, the countenance of a God so great in love as to communicate to us an indestructible hope, a hope that not even death can crack, because the life of those who entrust themselves to this Father always opens up to the perspective of eternal beatitude.
  

  The development of modern science has confined faith and hope more and more to the private and individual sphere, so much so that today it appears in an evident way, and sometimes dramatically, that the world needs God -- the true God! -- otherwise it remains deprived of hope. Science contributes much to the good of humanity -- without a doubt -- but it is not able to redeem humanity.
  

  Man is redeemed by love, which renders social life good and beautiful. Because of this the great hope, that one that is full and definitive, is guaranteed by God, by God who is love, who has visited us in Jesus and given his life to us, and in Jesus he will return at the end of time.
  

  It is in Christ that we hope and it is him that we await! With Mary, his Mother, the Church goes out to meet the Bridegroom: She does this with works of charity, because hope, like faith, is demonstrated in love.

  
  
• 12/05/07 - Benedict announced that he will grant the faithful a plenary indulgence for the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Lourdes [Zenit.org]. At the blog Hermeneutic of Continuity, Fr Tim Finigan discusses the meaning of plenary indulgences and the conditions for meeting them).
  

• 12/11/07 - Pope Benedict released his message for the World Day of Peace, to be celebrated Jan. 1, 2008. His theme: "The Human Family, a Community of Peace":

  ... The natural family, as an intimate communion of life and love, based on marriage between a man and a woman, constitutes the primary place of humanization' for the person and society(3), and a cradle of life and love. The family is therefore rightly defined as the first natural society, a divine institution that stands at the foundation of life of the human person as the prototype of every social order.
  

  Indeed, in a healthy family life we experience some of the fundamental elements of peace: justice and love between brothers and sisters, the role of authority expressed by parents, loving concern for the members who are weaker because of youth, sickness or old age, mutual help in the necessities of life, readiness to accept others and, if necessary, to forgive them. For this reason, the family is the first and indispensable teacher of peace.

  Zenit News Service interviewed Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, on the environmental aspects of the Holy Father's message:

  In his message for the World Day of Peace, Benedict XVI emphasized that today humanity fears for future ecological equilibrium.
  

  According to Father Lombardi, the Pope links a powerful moral appeal to solidarity, on the basis of the recognition of a universal destination of the goods of creation, that also takes the poor and future generations into account.
  

  The Vatican spokesman says that the Pope invites dialogue, serious scientific study of the problems without ideological escalation,' wisdom in the research on models of sustainable development and -- with significant concreteness -- he proposes an intensified dialogue between nations on the management of the planets energy resources.

  Unfortunately, some in the media (true to form) attempted to stir up some controversy; the UK Daily Mail reported the story with headlines screaming "The Pope condemns the climate change prophets of doom!" (see American Papist's analysis: Did the Pope condemn climate change? and John Allen Jr.'s "Benedict paints a Catholic shade of green" (National Catholic Reporter December 11, 2007).
  

• 12/12/07 - Pope Benedict receives his official portrait from a Russian Orthodox artist. Zenit News reports:

  Tsarkova is the first woman to be an official Vatican portrait painter. Pope John Paul II was the subject of her first official papal work. She painted him during the Jubilee Year 2000 and that portrait now hangs in the Vatican Museums.

  The private audience, which was supposed to last five minutes, lasted for 20, as Tsarkova explained the "secrets" in the painting -- specifically the angels that adorn the papal throne, which, she said, "come to life."
  

  Tsarkova said the angels seemed to be the Pope's favorite aspect of the portrait, noting that in his recent discourse on the role of bishops, he compared their work to that of the angels, God's messengers.
  

  Tsarkova said she wanted the painting to be symbolic. "The Holy Father," she said, "is seated on a throne and surrounded by angels and is symbolically resting upon them, a sign of the support they give him in his ministry."
  

  "In his hand, the Pope is holding a book of his discourses as a sign of his dialogue with the modern world," the artist continued. "This is a sign of peace because it is through dialogue that we can achieve peace."

  (See also: , by Elizabeth Lev. Zenit News Agency. December 14, 2007; Video of the unveiling; Profile: Natalia Tsarkova [in Italian]).
  

• 12/13/07 - Speaking to university students of Rome, Pope Benedict spiritually entrusted his second encyclical to the young people of the world:

  After a Mass celebrated by the Pontiff's vicar for Rome, Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the Holy Father addressed the young people: "I spiritually entrust [the encyclical] to you, dear university students of Rome, and through you, to the entire world of the university, the school, culture and of education.
  

  "Is the theme of hope perhaps not particularly suitable for youth?"
  

  He continued: "I propose to you that you reflect, individually and in groups, on that part of the encyclical which speaks about hope in the modern age.

  Click here for the full text of Benedict's address to the university students of Rome.
  

• 12/17/07 - Speaking to the Vatican Congregation for Saints' Causes, Pope Benedict admonished them: "All those who work in the causes of saints are called to place themselves at the exclusive service of truth":

  "Through beatifications and canonizations," Benedict XVI added, the Church "gives thanks to God for the gift of those of his children who have responded generously to divine grace, honoring them and invoking them as intercessors." And the Church "presents these shining examples for the imitation of all the faithful, called through baptism to sanctity, which is the aim and goal of every state of life."
  

  At the same time, he said, "ecclesial communities come to realize the need, even in our own time, of witnesses capable of incarnating the perennial truth of the Gospel in the real circumstances of life, making it an instrument of salvation for the entire world."
  

  The Holy Father added: "Saints, if correctly presented in their spiritual dynamism and historical reality, contribute to making the word of the Gospel and the mission of the Church more believable and attractive. Contact with them opens the way to true spiritual resurrection, lasting conversion and the flowering of new saints.

  
  
• 12/18/07 - Pope Benedict XVI created a special panel to study the possible sainthood of a predecessor, Pius XII, although the media is divided as to his motives for doing so. According to Agence France-Presse:

  "The pope does not want to sign and intends to keep a close watch over this sensitive issue," a Vatican source told I-media news agency, which specializes in coverage of the Holy See.

  "The best way to postpone a decision is to create a special commission."

  ; Reuters, on the other hand, has a different perspective:

  Il Giornale reported that Benedict has decided to set up a committee in his Secretariat of State, the Vatican's diplomatic section, to review old documents from the World War Two period and study new ones that have come to light. [...]

  Last May, the Vatican's saint-making department voted in favour of a decree recognising Pius's "heroic virtues", a major hurdle in a long process toward sainthood that began in 1967.
  

  But Benedict has so far not approved the decree, meaning that the process is effectively stalled and that Pius cannot move on to beatification, or the last step before sainthood.
  

  Il Giornale reporter Andrea Tornielli, who has written four books about Pius, said the Vatican was not questioning his holiness but was concerned about the wider ramifications of making him a saint too soon.

  For more information see Pope Pius XII, the Catholic Church and the Holocaust, an archive of news and commentary.
  
• 12/19/07 - Donna Hobson, director of publications at the Catholic University of America, unveiled the logo for Pope Benedict's 2008 papal visit to the United States:

  The theme reflects the Holy Father's new encyclical, "Spe Salvi," an invitation for people to personally encounter Jesus Christ. In the encyclical, the Pontiff said that faith in Christ brings well-founded hope in eternal salvation, the "great hope" that can sustain people through the trials of this world.
  

  The logo features a full color photograph of Benedict XVI waving both hands. Behind him is a yellow-screened image of the dome of St. Peter's Basilica. In black type running at the top and over the cupola of the dome are three lines of type reading "Pope Benedict XVI/Christ Our Hope/Apostolic Journey to the United States 2008."

  
  
• 12/21/07 - Exchanging traditional Christmas greetings with cardinals, bishops and members of the Curia, Pope Benedict recalled some highlights of 2007 -- and with particular fondness his trip to Brazil (Zenit News):

  Referring to his encounter with young people in So Paolo, he observed: "There are mass events which have the single effect of self-affirmation, in which people allow themselves to be carried away by rhythm and sounds, and end up deriving joy merely from themselves.
  

  "On that occasion [in Brazil], however, [...] the profound communion which spontaneously arose between us caused us, by being with one another, to be for one another. It was not an escape from daily life, but became a source of strength for accepting life in a new way."
  

  Recalling the May 11 canonization of Brazilian St. Antnio de Santa'Ana Galvo, the Pope said, "Each saint who enters into history represents a small portion of Christ's return, a renewal of his entrance into time, showing us his image in a new light and making us sure of his presence."
  

  "Jesus Christ does not belong to the past," the Holy Father affirmed, "and he is not confined to a distant future. [...] Together with his saints, he is [...] journeying toward us, toward our today."

  Turning to his meeting with Brazilian bishops, the Pope highlighted how "the experience of 'effective and affectionate collegiality' of fraternal communion in the shared ministry led us to feel the joy of catholicity. Over and above all geographical and cultural confines we are brothers, together with the risen Christ who has called us to his service."

  Pope Benedict also commented on the theme of the General Conference of the Bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean ("Disciples and Missionaries of Jesus Christ, So That Our Peoples May Have Life in Him"):

  "Those who have recognized a great truth, those who have discovered a great joy," he said, "must pass it on, they cannot keep it to themselves. [...] In order to reach fulfillment, history needs the announcement of the good news to all peoples, to all men and women. How important it is for forces of reconciliation, of peace, of love and of justice to come together in humanity.
  

  "And this is what happens in the Christian mission. Through the encounter with Jesus Christ and his saints, [humankind] is re-equipped with those forces for good without which none of our plans for social order is realized but, faced with the enormous pressure of other interests contrary to peace and justice, remain as abstract theories."

  (Click here for a roundup of Benedict's May 2007 Apostolic Visit to Brazil).
  

• 12/24/07 - Muslim scholars sent Christmas greetings, responding to the Pope's invitation for a major dialogue session at the Vatican in 2008:

  A letter from Jordan's Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad bin Talal, architect of the Muslim scholars' project, said the group planned to send representatives to the Vatican in February or March to work out details of the dialogue.
  

  The letter, dated Dec. 12 and addressed to Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Vatican secretary of state, thanked the pope for inviting the Muslim experts to meet with him and for the pontiff's personal encouragement of the dialogue initiative. [...]
  

  The prince's letter said that although the Muslim scholars think that complete theological agreement between Christians and Muslims is impossible by definition, they do wish to seek a common stand based on areas of agreement -- "whether we wish to call this kind of dialogue 'theological' or 'spiritual' or something else."
  

  The Muslim response was the latest in a series of cooperative steps that began in October, when 138 Muslim scholars addressed a letter to the pope and other Christian leaders. [...]
  

  The message noted the recent close of the Muslim feast of the hajj or pilgrimage, which commemorates the faith of the Prophet Abraham. It said God's refusal of the sacrifice of Abraham's son reminds all followers of the Abrahamic faiths to "do their utmost to save, uphold and treasure every single human life and especially the lives of every single child."
  

  It pointed out that Muslim scholars recently issued a declaration affirming "the sanctity of human life -- of every human life -- as an essential and foundational teaching in Islam that all Muslim scholars are in unanimous agreement upon."
  

  The Christmas greeting offered a prayer that the new year may bring "healing and peace to our suffering world" and "mutual forgiveness within and between communities."

  For further details on this story and links to past reporting, see: Pope Benedict Responds to "A Common Word" (Muslim Invitation to Dialogue) November 29, 2007.
  

  For an appraisal of the state of Muslim-Christian relations and the coming meeting, see Fr. Samir Khalil's Benedict XVI's improbable dialogue with 138 Muslim scholars AsiaNews.it. January 9, 2008 and The Cardinal Writes, the Prince Responds. The Factors that Divide the Pope from the Muslims, by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa. January 2, 2008.
  

• 12/25/07 - On Christmas day Pope Benedict XVI received holiday greetings from . . . Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?:

  "Hereby, I felicitate Christians, monotheists and justice seekers throughout the world on the auspicious birthday of Jesus Christ (PBUH)," an official message sent to the Roman Catholic Leader on Tuesday read.
  

  Jesus Christ was chosen by God to bring blessing to all human beings. The very essence of his teachings contained monotheism, justice, passion and kindness, the message added.
  

  "His Holiness is well informed that all divine religions seek to promote the same reality. Their paths all pass through monotheism and the promotion of moral values," the message said.

  Shortly thereafter, the President of Iran returned to his favorite pasttimes of heaping scorn upon the United States and Israel.
  

• 12/24/07: Midnight Mass: Homily of Benedict XVI
  
• 12/25/07: "Urbi et Orbi" Message of Benedict XVI - Christmas
  
• 12/25/07: "Urbi et Orbi" Blessing of Benedict XVI - Christmas
  
• 12/26/07: Angelus of Benedict XVI - Feast of Saint Stephen
  
• 12/30/07: Angelus of Benedict XVI - Feast of the Holy Family
  
• 12/31/07: Vespers and Te Deum of Benedict XVI
  

• 01/01/08: Homily of Benedict XVI - Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
  
• 01/01/08: Angelus of Benedict XVI - Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
  
• 01/01/08: Message of Benedict XVI - 41st World Day of Peace
  
• 01/02/08: General Audience of Benedict XVI: Mary, Mother of God
  
• 01/06/08: Homily of Benedict XVI - Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord
  
• 01/06/08: Angelus of Benedict XVI - Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord
  
• 01/13/08: Homily of Benedict XVI - Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
  
• 01/13/08: Angelus of Benedict XVI - Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
  

January

• 01/04/08 - In what had to be one of the funniest headlines of the year, Peter Popham of The Independent fumes "Science bows to theology as the Pope dismantles Vatican observatory" -- the brutal fist of the Roman Catholic Church dealing a crushing blow to academic freedom? Well, not quite:

  [The Church is] dismantling of the astronomical observatory that has been part of Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome, for more than 75 years. The Pope needs more room to receive diplomats so the telescopes have to go.

  The eviction of the astronomers and their instruments, reported by the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, and their removal to a disused convent a mile away, marks the end of a period of intimacy between popes and priest-astronomers that has lasted well over a century.

  Father Jose G Funes, the present director of the observatory, known as the Specola Vaticana, insisted that there was no sinister significance in the move. "It is not a downgrading of science in the Vatican," he said. "To remain within the palace would have had only a symbolic significance, whereas where we are going we will be even more comfortable.

  
  

• 01/01/08 - On New Year's Day Pope Benedict greeted more than 2 million participants in a pro-family march in Madrid, urging them to be witnesses "of the beauty of human love". Zenit News reports:

  The event in Madrid was organized by the archdiocese with the support of ecclesial movements as well as pro-life and pro-family organizations.
  

  Addressing the participants in Spanish, the Holy Father said: "I invite all Christian families to experience the loving presence of the Lord in their lives. I encourage them, inspired by love of Christ for all mankind, to give witness before the world of the beauty of human love, marriage and family.
  

  "This, founded in the indissoluble union between a man and a woman, constitutes the privileged environment in which human life is welcomed and protected, from its beginning until its natural end."
  

  The Pontiff underlined the "right and fundamental obligation" of parents "to educate their children, in the faith and in the values that dignify human existence."
  

  "It is worth it to work for the family and marriage," continued Benedict XVI, "because it is worth it to work for the human being, the most valuable being created by God."

  
  
• 01/04/08 - Pope Benedict visited with nuns at the Missionaries of Charity in Rome, commending them on their work and the witness of their founder:

  "For many years, when I was prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, I would spend several hours of the day near your praiseworthy institution, desired by my venerable predecessor, the Servant of God John Paul II, and entrusted by him to Blessed Teresa of Calcutta," Benedict XVI said. "Thus, I was able to appreciate the generous service of Gospel charity which the Missionaries of Charity have been carrying out for almost 20 years now with the help and collaboration of many people of good will."
  

  The Holy Father reflected on Blessed Teresa's desire to call the house Gift of Mary, "hoping, as it were, that it might always be possible to experience in it the love of the Blessed Virgin."
  

  "For anyone who knocks at the door, it is in fact a gift of Mary to feel welcomed by the loving arms of the sisters and volunteers," he said. "The presence of those who are ready to listen to people in difficulty and serve them with that very attitude which impelled Mary to go straightaway to St. Elizabeth is another gift of Mary.
  

  "May this style of Gospel love always seal and distinguish your vocation so that, in addition to material aid, you may communicate to all whom you meet daily on your path that same passion for Christ and that shining 'smile of God' which enlivened Mother Teresa's life."

  
  
• 01/07/08 - During his address to ambassadors to the Holy See, Benedict emphasized the need for security and protection from purveyors of weapons of mass destruction:

  . . . I wish to urge the international community to make a global commitment on security. A joint effort on the part of States to implement all the obligations undertaken and to prevent terrorists from gaining access to weapons of mass destruction would undoubtedly strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime and make it more effective. I welcome the agreement reached on the dismantling of North Korea's nuclear weapons programme, and I encourage the adoption of suitable measures for the reduction of conventional weapons and for dealing with the humanitarian problems caused by cluster munitions.

  Taking note of the current crisis with Iran's nuclear program, Benedict urged "for continued and uninterrupted pursuit of the path of diplomacy in order to resolve the issue of Iran's nuclear programme, by negotiating in good faith, adopting measures designed to increase transparency and mutual trust, and always taking account of the authentic needs of peoples and the common good of the human family."
  
• 01/09/08 - Pope Benedict devoted his January 9th general audience on the life of "the greatest Father of the Latin Church": St. Augustine of Hippo:

  This man of passion and faith, of the highest intelligence and tireless in his pastoral care, a great Saint and Doctor of the Church is often known, at least by hearsay, even by those who ignore Christianity or who are not familiar with it, because he left a very deep mark on the cultural life of the West and on the whole world. Because of his special importance St Augustine's influence was widespread. It could be said on the one hand that all the roads of Latin Christian literature led to Hippo (today Annaba, on the coast of Algeria), the place where he was Bishop from 395 to his death in 430, and, on the other, that from this city of Roman Africa, many other roads of later Christianity and of Western culture itself branched out.
  

  A civilization has seldom encountered such a great spirit who was able to assimilate Christianity's values and exalt its intrinsic wealth, inventing ideas and forms that were to nourish the future generations, as Paul VI also stressed: "It may be said that all the thought-currents of the past meet in his works and form the source which provides the whole doctrinal tradition of succeeding ages."

  
  
• 01/14/08 - Pope Benedict gave public witness to his teachings on the liturgy when he celebrated mass ad orientem - Catholic News Agency reports:

  Vatican City, Jan 15, 2008 / 04:22 am (CNA).- Pope Benedict XVI celebrated Mass on Sunday in the Sistine Chapel, using the churchs original altar beneath Michelangelos depiction of the Last Judgment instead of the removable altar used by Pope John Paul II.
  

  The Vaticans office for liturgical celebrations issued a statement saying the decision to use the old altar was used to respect "the beauty and the harmony of this architectural jewel."
  

  Using the old altar meant that Pope Benedict occasionally celebrated the liturgy with his back to the people, a posture called ad orientem or towards the east in the traditional phrasing. It was the first time Mass had been celebrated in the Chapel in such a way since the Second Vatican Council, which took place between 1962 and 1965.
  

  The choice echoes part of the Popes reintroduction of traditional liturgical practices, some of which were phased out by the Second Vatican Council.

  Shawn Tribe @ The New Liturgical Movement offers photographs and commentary on this momentous event:

  The liturgy celebrated is that of the Baptism of the Lord. Baptism, of course, is the beginning of new life and the initiation into Christian life and perhaps in a fitting bit of symbolism, the Pope has sent forth a clear message, a re-baptism if you will of the place of common sacred, liturgical direction in the life of the church.
  

  While the Council itself never abolished this ancient liturgical practice of the Christian East and West, and while liturgical law has always allowed this, as I have said before, the example -- and particularly the public example -- of the Pope does matter for Catholics. This is a teaching moment and it can be reasonably expected that this will send a clear message that ad orientem is conciliar and has a central, normal place in the liturgical life of the Church.

  As Rich Leonardi remarked, a case of "Do as I say and I do".
  

  Turning to the thought of the Holy Father himself on this matter, from chapter 3 of The Spirit of the Liturgy, here is then-Cardinal Ratzinger on "The Altar and the Direction of Liturgical Prayer"; and Pope Benedict's Foreword to U.M. Lang's Turning Towards the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical Prayer.
  

Excerpts

"Ox and Ass Know Their Lord", by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (from The Blessing of Christmas: Meditations for the Season Ignatius Press, 2007).

• Fr. James V. Schall on Pope Benedict and the Defense of Reason - Interview with Ken Masugi for the Claremont Review of Books December 13, 2007. This interview covers the relationship between reason and faith and its political implications. It explores the themes of the Pope's recent encyclical on hope (Spe Salvi) and Fr. Schall's most recent books.
  

• "Jesus of Nazareth" Gets a Special Reviewer: The Vicar of the Man Who Wrote It, by Sandro Magister. www.Chiesa December 14, 2007. How cardinal Camillo Ruini explained to the priests of Rome the book by Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI. Including its political applications, which are never sacred and definitive, but always must be "re-elaborated, reformulated, and corrected."
  

• 07/07/07: the Church changed forever, by by Damian Thompson. The Telegraph December 26, 2007:

  There is only one candidate for my religious highlight of 2007: that glorious day in July when Pope Benedict XVI healed a disastrous rift in the history of the Western Church by restoring the ancient Latin Mass to its full dignity.

  
  

• The Ratzinger Revolution continues -- in November, the Telegraph announced that the Pope was intending on "purging" the Vatican of modern music:

  The Pope is considering a dramatic overhaul of the Vatican in order to force a return to traditional sacred music.

  After reintroducing the Latin Tridentine Mass, the Pope wants to widen the use of Gregorian chant and baroque sacred music.
  

  In an address to the bishops and priests of St Peter's Basilica, he said that there needed to be "continuity with tradition" in their prayers and music.
  

  He referred pointedly to "the time of St Gregory the Great", the pope who gave his name to Gregorian chant.
  

  Gregorian chant has been reinstituted as the primary form of singing by the new choir director of St Peter's, Father Pierre Paul.

  Related reading: Cardinal Ratzinger on Liturgical Music, by Michael J. Miller. Homiletic & Pastoral Review July 2000; "Music and the Liturgy" excerpt from Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger's The Spirit of the Liturgy.
  

• Pope gets radical and woos the Anglicans, by Damian Thompson. Telegraph November 15, 2007:

  The 80-year-old Pontiff is planning a purification of the Roman liturgy in which decades of trendy innovations will be swept away. This recovery of the sacred is intended to draw Catholics closer to the Orthodox and ultimately to heal the 1,000 year Great Schism. But it is also designed to attract vast numbers of conservative Anglicans, who will be offered the protection of the Holy Father if they covert en masse.

  The liberal cardinals don't like the sound of it at all. . . .

  After discussing the devious tactics some bishops have used in their attmepts to frustrate Benedict XVI's "reform of the reform," Thompson relays this bit of news:

  Last month, the bishops of the Traditional Anglican Communion, a network of 400,000 breakaway Anglo-Catholics based mainly in America and the Commonwealth, wrote to Rome asking for "full, corporate, sacramental union".
  

  Their letter was drafted with the help of the Vatican. Benedict is overseeing the negotiations. Unlike John Paul II, he admires the Anglo-Catholic tradition. He is thinking of making special pastoral arrangements for Anglican converts walking away from the car wreck of the Anglican Communion.
  

  This would mean that they could worship together, free from bullying by local bishops who dislike the newcomers' conservatism and would rather "dialogue" with Anglicans than receive them into the Church.

  
  

On a Lighter Note

• In the course of 2007, there have been almost 3 million faithful and pilgrims that have participated at public gatherings with Benedict XVI at the Vatican and at the papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo - Zenit News. January 6, 2008.
  

• During his January 9th general audience, Pope Benedict met with Italian soccer players, praising the sport as "an instrument for teaching values of honesty, solidarity and fraternity, especially among the youth". The players in turn gave the Holy Father a soccer ball and blue jersey from the Italian national team, emblazoned with "Benedetto XVI."
  

• New Holland Presents Pope with Tractor, by Farmer's Weekly Interactive. November 21, 2007:

  Pope Benedict XVI recently received the keys to a special tractor from Fiat's head man, Sergio Marchionne.
  

  The New Holland T7050 tractor is painted white and carries the Papal coat of arms.
  

  It will be used to tow a huge platform - which accommodates His Holiness during his regular Wednesday general audiences in St. Peter's Square, the Vatican - into position.

  
  
• On December 15, film, stage and opera director Franco Zeffirelli criticized the Pope's cold image and showy clothes, offering the Holy Father his services as an image consultant:

  Even his wardrobe needs to be revised, the 84-year-old Zeffirelli was quoted as saying. These are not times of high-tailored church wear. Instead, his vestments should reflect sobriety, the director said. The papal vestments have been done over to be too sumptuous and showy.