Benedict XVI will be seen
as an innovator who helped the Church
keep the faith in a completely new age
Interview with Peter Seewald
by Paolo Lepri
Translated from
February 12, 2013
BERLIN – Peter Seewald has always thought that Benedict XVI would resign if he felt he no longer had the strength to carry out his ministry as Pope.
In fact, it was he who brought up this possibility with the Pope in the book-length interview
Light of the World, which resulted from a series of conversations in Castel Gandolfo in the summer of 2010.
“I understood then that he had thought about this at length. And he is a man who does what he thinks and what he says”, said Seewald, the 58-year-old German journalist and author, when this newspaper reached by telephone at his home in Munich.
"His idea of leading the Church,” he says, “has nothing to do with the exercise of power, only with its religious and spiritual dimension. This outlook has been characteristic of him”.
So you would have been one of the first to learn, or at least, to imagine, that this would happen. Who did the Pope consult before taking the decision he announced yesterday?
With Jesus Christ.
How much did his health have to do with this decision?
Benedict XVI cannot be described as ailing from a strictly medical point of view. But he does have the infirmities that are common to a man his age – tiredness, loss of strength. He has a problem seeing with one eye, and he now walks with difficulty. Obviously, he has understood that he cannot go on as Pope this way.
So what will he be doing now?
It’s difficult to say because this has never happened in modern times. He will be a cardinal again. I do not know if he will have anything to do with the next conclave or if he will completely keep his distance. But he will not fail to offer his support and Christian closeness to his successor. However, I think that he may completely retreat to a spiritual dimension. He did not seek this office, to which he has dedicated all his powers as far as he could.
How do you think he will be remembered?
As an innovator, who taught the Church to keep the contents of the faith in a new age. No other Pope has left a legacy of writings that are so important and profound. No one has written such an important work on Jesus. The eight years of his Pontificate have led to a renewal of the Church which today is more internally united.
What are the fundamental characteristics of his personality?
Courage, and the genius to be able to present spirituality in simple ways. He is a person of great authoritativeness but also one who has great lightness. He makes it easy for anyone to talk to him.
His Pontificate will be remembered for having made clear to everyone the centrality of God. This is what will remain, beyond the terrible scandals that have marked his Pontificate.
[But the scandals were mostly media-generated, insofar as they had to do with Benedict XVI himself. Media tried to make him the scapegoat for all the cases of sex abuse by priests in the 1960s to the 1990s that only lately have surfaced in countries like Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Ireland. And Vatileaks had nothing substantial by way of 'evil and corruption' that reflected badly on the Pope at all, even if it was the sordid tale of betrayal by a megalomaniacal valet.]
How do you rate his work against the scandal of pedophile priests?
As he said once, it has been an ‘infinite' blow to him. But it will be seen that he had always wanted to confront this problem, even as a cardinal when he realized the extent and gravity of it. He never tried to sweep it under the rug and has considered it the priority to get justice for the victims and to help the victims.
But his governance of the Church has not been easy…
He has had to govern in difficult times. But whenever he decided to do something, he did it. However, he ought to have had more support from within the Vatican and from the Church in Germany.
What are your personal feelings on a day like this?
I am split between sadness and gratitude for all that this Pope has done.
It is remarkable that Benedict the Innovator is also the theme of the following essay by a Church historian who is a regular contributor to L'Oseervatore Romano...
Benedict XVI -
An unacknowledged innovator
by Lucetta Scaraffia
Translated from
February 12, 2013
Whoever has not grasped the innovative significance of the figure and Pontificate of Joseph Ratzinger - and continues to see him and to interpret his words and deeds as proof of his conservatism and rejection of anything new - has now been roundly refuted by his sudden and unforeseen resignation, which is an absolute innovation. In addition to being an extraordinary gesture of humility and love for the Church.
Because Joseph Ratzinger has been a novelty in many ways.
There has never been, at least in the last few centuries, a Pope who is also a great intellectual capable of giving new interpretations to the historical moment that the Church is living and to propose courageous ways of intervention by Catholics.
[This is the second time I have seen Scaraffia make a statement like this, which is strange and wrong coming from a Church historian. Pius XII, Paul VI and John Paul II were all considered great intellectuals (not to mention that John XXIII nor John Paul I were far from intellectual slouches!) - the question is whether they were able to analyze the culture and adapt the Church's ways of evangelization to the culture in which she operates the way Benedict XVI has done.]
In fact, his Pontificate has been characterized by great and prolific intellectial work in seeking to understand the present in order to find new ways to make the Gospel message actual and relevant.
His three books on Jesus constitute a synthesis of faith and reason that allows the reader to encounter Jesus as a consistent historical figure
[and what about his divinity?] who is acceptable in the present culture.
But many of his addresses and catecheses also cast new light on the current social and cultural situation with analyses that are dense with significance and rich with proposals about what Catholics can do to affirm themselves and bear witness to Christ.
Without a true understanding of what ails the contemporary world, it is difficult to move in any direction. And that is why he has continually denounced various forms of relativism, why he has continually appealed that faith must always be accompanied by reason in order not to be neutralized by the scientistic world of today.
He has shown a constant will to understand contemporary society and contemporary men. He has been capable of surprising in this respect, as when, at the German Parliament, he praised the opinions and actions of many non-believers who on some delicate issues are more in line with Catholic teaching than some Catholics are.
Starting with choosing the papal name Benedict, he has not tired of indicating the priority of a new evangelization in Europe, a continent that is forgetting or ignoring its Christian roots.
The need for this new evangelization has been such a priority in this Pontificate along with the purification of the Church, a condition that is more than ever necessary to make the Christian message credible.
This theme of purification - which he memorably expressed in the Good Friday meditations of 2005 before became Pope - has to do with the problem that has weighed most heavily on his Pontificate.
Benedict XVI has had to pay for the sins of others, carrying on his back the weight of the pedophile scandals [that mostly took place in the 1960s-1990s] which he had faced courageously as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith when John Paul II gave his dicastery the primary responsibility for dealing with accusations from everywhere that were ignored at the diocesan level.
With the same courage and desire for truth, he has continued to denounce, in his addresses to the Curia, the poisonous effects of internal fights involving power and money. This is without a doubt the thorniest and most insidious issue that he has had to face within the Church - a fight that he leaves to his successor as an exigent necessity.
[The exhortations have not been limited to the Curia but have in fact been frequently directed to bishops and priests whom he has often asked not to pursue careerism but rather their pastoral ministry.]
With his meek and gentle ways, devoid of charisma as this is commonly and superficially understood, he has shown he is able to speak to the 'crowd' and warm their hearts, renewing faith and enthusiasm in young people and in women, ion the elderly and in priests - everyone who has been to one of his public events have acknowledged and appreciated his uniquely personal style.
But there is no doubt that the most powerful significance of his Pontificate is in his latest gesture - a decision that deeply confirms his extraordinary spiritual stature. And above all, his trust in God, into whose hands he places the destiny of the Church. His trust that the Holy Spirit will make himself felt, as he has in all the conclaves of the 20th century and the 2005 Conclave - breaking up aggrupations and alliances and leading the cardinals to somehow always choose the best man appropriate for the historical moment.
Even if Benedict XVI's unexpected decision may leave the Catholics who love him feeling sad and even somewhat abandoned, we can all join him in looking with hope and trust towards what God has in store for the future of the Church.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 12/02/2013 20:50]