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BENEDICT XVI: NEWS, PAPAL TEXTS, PHOTOS AND COMMENTARY

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I posted an item about this last week when the Vatican announced there would be a news briefing today about it. I have chosen to use the report from the Jewish news agency for today's update.



Pope to attend concert
marking WWII anniversary




ROME, Oct. 1 (JTA) -- Pope Benedict XVI will attend a concert to mark the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II, the Vatican announced.

The concert, scheduled for Oct. 8 in a major Rome concert hall near the Vatican, is being organized by the Vatican Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the German Embassy to the Holy See and a German cultural association.

A German youth orchestra will perform pieces by the Jewish-born composers Gustav Mahler and Felix Mendelssohn. In addition, poetry will be recited, including works by Holocaust survivor Paul Celan and children held prisoner in the Terezin (Theresienstadt) ghetto-concentration camp near Prague.

The concert is part of a series of Vatican events to mark the anniversary.

"We cannot forget the dramatic events that led to one of the most terrible wars in history that caused millions and millions of deaths and so much suffering," the Pope said earlier this month in a sermon given in Viterbo, Italy. The war, he said, was "a conflict that saw the tragedy of the Holocaust and the extermination of throngs of other innocents."

The Pope added, "The memory of these events impels us to pray for the victims and for the people who still bear the wounds in their body and heart. May it also be a warning to all never to repeat such barbarities and, in our time still marked by conflicts and opposition, to redouble efforts to build lasting peace, passing on especially to the new generations a culture and lifestyle marked by love, solidarity and esteem for the other."


There's more information from the Vatican bulletin today on the news briefing, particularly in the opening statement made by Cardinal Kasper:


News briefing on the concert
Translated from



At 11:30 today, in the Aula Giovanni Paolo II of the Holy See Press Office, a briefing was held on a concert to be held on October 8 in the presence of His Holiness Benedict XVI, an initiative of a movement called Youth Against War which will present the Inter-Regionales Jugendssymphonie Orchester (IRO) as part of the project "1939-2009: 70 years since the start of the Second World War".

The concert will take place on Thursday, Oct. 8, at the Auditorium on Via della Concilizazione.



Taking part at the briefing were Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting christian Unity; H.E. Hans-Henning Horstmann, German ambassador to the Holy See; and Fr. Federico Lombardi, Vatican press director.

Here is a translation of Cardinal Kasper's presentation:


2009 is a year of important anniversaries: the events we commemorate left a profound mark on history.

Twenty years ago, in an unexpected and peaceful manner, the Wall came down which had divided Germany into two states and the world into two blocs.

Seventy years ago, with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Second World War erupted - a war which was European at first but eventually saw 47 nations in close alliance against Hitler and his regime.

The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the Vatican Commission for Religious Relationships with Judaism, the German embassy to the Holy See, and the KulturForum Europeo of Mainau (Germany) are sponsoring a concert which, in re-elaborating the tragic memory of that war, can hopefully engage not only the generation which experienced its horrors but also the youth and all who wish to value the teachings from the past in order to create a better world.

This is also a reminder that in order to promote and keep the peace, the constant commitment and participation of individuals and institutions are essential.

This is precisely what the musicians coming from ten different nations wish to prove by their performance, their music and their enthusiasm.

The painful memory of the Second World War - or better still, the desire to start from a new basis - was in fact one of the factors that initiated the ecumenical movement. The Ecumenical Council of Churches was instituted on the example of the League of Nations adn the United Nations.

The Second World War was also the unfortunate occasion for the inhuman project of exterminating the Jewish people. Barbarous acts and brutalities assumed Satanic proportions in those years, leading some to think that God had forgotten or abandoned his people and all of mankind, as the Holy Father Benedict XVI recalled when he visited Auschwitz and the Synagogue in Cologne.

But even after the war ended, the wounds have remained. To heal these wounds and others, the Catholic Church became one of the principal promoters around the world of reconciliation and the process of healing memory, with an increasingly decisive voice.

This commitment provides the background for the concert. At the same time, it wishes to remind that dialog is the only alternative to war. The ecumenical movement shows how belligerent neighbors, who had in teh past wounded each other in confessional wars, have now become once again brothers in Christ , contributing to the re-pacification of peoples and nations.

Equally important to underscore is that, despite a tragic and painful past, collaboration between Christians and Jews is now founded on a solid basis. Even doubts and difficulties can be overcome in reciprocal respect and sympathy. For all this, constant prayer and daily commitment are essential. Each of us can contribute in his own way to dialog and reconciliation. Even through music.

And helping to promote this idea is an extraordinary orchestra composed of young musicians from 10 nations. Two conductors, Prof. Wolfgang Gönnenwein and Jochem Hochstenbach have accepted to work with the orchestra. Alongside them, we acknowledge the generous participation of two world-renowned actors: Prof. Klaus Maria Brandauer and Madame Michelle Breedt.

The musical program will consist of compositions by Gustav Mahler and Felix Mendlssohn Bartholdy. Two Lieder, Urlicht and Irdisches leben from Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn [The boy's magic horn) cycle will follow the fourth movement of the composer's Symphony No. 5.. Mendelssohn's Fourth Symphony (Italian) will conclude the concert.

I wish to point out that the musical choices were dictated by the fact that both composers were Jewish by birth and experienced strong anti-Semitism all their life. Both were later baptized - Mendelssohn as a Protestant, Mahler as a Catholic. Under the Nazi regime, their music was forbidden.

Klaus Maria Brandauer will recite some pieces from German literature: texts by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Heinrich Heine, Berthold Brecht, and Paul Celan, as well as two poems written by children who were interned in the concentration camp of Theresienstadt.

We are happy that the International Jewish Committee for Inter-religious Consultations agree to be a patron for this concert. Its member organizations are: American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, Anti-Defamation League, B’nai B’rith International, Central Conference of American Rabbis, Israel Jewish Council on Inter-Religious Relations, Rabbinical Assembly, Rabbinical Council of America, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations, Union for Reform Judaism, United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, World Jewish Congress.

This concert has been made possible with the generous financial and organizational aid of many German and Italian corporations.




[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 03/10/2009 00:27]
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