The Ratzinger Report

191 Pages·1985·62.288 MB·English

by  Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger and Vittorio Messori

THE
--
RATZINGER
-
REPORT:
An Pxclusive Interview
v ~ v
~n t~e ~tate ~f ~he ~hurcy
JOSEPH ~ARDINAL !SATZINGER/
- with
VITTORIO MESSORI,,
I.) - -
BY
Translated ~lvator !ittanasio
- and Graham Harrison.
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c.,\ 985.
r .>IGNATIUS PRESS) SAN FRANCISCO
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Translated from the authorized
German manuscript.
Italian/ 'epion published
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Cl1985, Edizioni Paoline, 1taiy
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Cover by Marcia Ryan
With ecclesiastical approval
c 1985 Ignatius Press, San Francisco
Second printing 1986
All rights reserved
I
ISBN 0-89870-080-9 (PB)
ISBN 0-89870-085-x (HB)
Library of Congress catalogue nun1ber 85-081218
Printed in the United States of America
.,
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. AN UNUSUAL ENCOUNTER 9
Passion and reason, 9. Vacations, Cardinal
style, II. Left/ right; optimism/ pessimism, 12.
The "too much" and the "too little", 15. A the
ologian and a pastor, 17. The shadow of the
Holy Office, 20. A misunderstood service?, 22.
"Heresy still exists", 24.
2. A COUNCIL TO BE REDISCOVERED 27
Two counterposed errors, 27. Let us rediscover
the true Vatican II, 29. A prescription against
anachronism, 31. Spirit and anti-spirit, 33. "Not
rupture but continuity", 35. Restoration?, 37.
Unforeseen effects, 38. The hope of the
" movements" , 42.
3. AT THE ROOT OF THE CRISIS:
THE IDEA OF CHURCH 45
The fayade and the mystery, 45. "It is not ours,
it is his", 48. For a real reform, 49.
4. AMONG PRIESTS AND BISHOPS 55
Priest: a man of inquietude, 55. The problem of
episcopal conferences, 58. "To find personal
courage again", 6I. Teachers of faith, 64.
Rome, despite everything, 66.
-
CONTENTS
DANGER SIGNS
5.
71
"An individualistic theology", 7r. "A shattered
catechesis", 72. "The broken bond between
Church and Scripture", 7 4. "The Son reduced,
the Father forgotten", 77. "Restore a place to
original sin", 78.
6. THE DRAMA OF MORALITY
From liberalism to permissivism, 83. "A series
of ruptures", 84. "Far from society or far from
the Magisterium?", 86. Seeking fixed points of
reference, 89.
7. WOMEN, A WOMAN
93
A priesthood in question, 93. Against "trivial
ized" sex, 94. In defense of nature, 96. Femi
nism in the convent, 99. A future without
Sisters?, 101. A remedy: Mary, 104. Six reasons
for not forgetting, 106. Fatima and environs, 109.
8. A SPIRITUALITY FOR TODAY II3
Faith and the body, IIJ. Different with respect to
the "world", n4. The challenge of the sects, u7.
9. LITURGY: BETWEEN OLD AND NEW II9
Saving the riches, n9. The language, for exam
ple · · · , r22. "Pluralism, but for all", 123- A
space for the sacred, r25. Sounds and images for
the Eternal, Solemnity, not triumphalism,
127.
130
· Eucharist at the heart of the faith, 132. "Not
only the Mass"' r34.
CONTENTS
10. ON SOME "LAST THINGS" 135
The devil and his trail, 135. An ever-timely
topic, 138. A suspicious "farewell", 14r. "Ex
egetes or sociologists?", 143· Purgatory and
limbo, 145. A service for the world, 148. Don't
forget the angels, 149. The return of the Spirit,
15!.
n. BRETHREN, BUT SEPARATED 155
A more "modern" Christianity?, 155. Some are
reconsidering, 159. A long road, 161. But the
Bible is Catholic, 164. Churches in disarray,
166.
12. A CERTAIN "LIBERATION"
An instruction to read, 169. The need of
redemption, 171. The text of a "private the
ologian", 173. Between marxism and capital
ism, 186. An impossible dialogue, 188.
lJ. PROCLAIMING CHRIST AGAIN 191
In defense of the missions, 191. A Gospel for
Africa, 192. "There is but one Savior", 196.
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CHAPTER ONE
AN UNUSUAL ENCOUNTER
Passion and reason
"An aggressive German of lordly air, an ascetic who carries
the cross like a sword."
"An earthy Bavarian of friendly visage who lives un
pretentiously in a modest dwelling in the vicinity of the
Vatican."
"An iron-dad cardinal [Panzer-Kardinall who has never
laid aside the splendid robes and the golden pectoral cross of
a prince of the Roman Church."
"He goes around in a short jacket and tie; he often drives
through Rome behind the wheel of a small car. Anyone see
ing him would never imagine he is one of the most impor
tant personages in the Vatican."
These quotations (authentic, of course), culled from news
paper articles which appeared all over the world, could be
continued. These articles (some of which were published in
the Milan monthly Jesus and translated into many lan
guages) were commenting on statements extracted from an
interview granted to us by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger who,
since January 1982, has been Prefect of the Sacred Congrega
tion for the Doctrine of the Faith. As is well known, this is
the Vatican authority which up to twenty years ago, and for
four centuries prior thereto, was called the "Roman and
Universal Inquisition", or the "Holy Office".
9
THE RATZINGER REPORT
IO
After reading such contradictory descriptions of Cardinal
Ratzinger's physical appearance, some malicious persons
n1ight still harbor the suspicion that all the other comments
probably also fall short of that ideal of "objective news
reporting" so often discussed at professional gatherings of
journalists.
Having no wish to voice an opinion on this particular
matter, we shall limit ourselves to the reminder that there is
a positive side to everything.
Perhaps in our case these contradictory "transfigurations"
undergone by the Prefect of the Faith, penned by some (cer
tainly not all) of our colleagues, are a sign of the keen in
terest aroused by our interview with the responsible head of
a Congregation whose reserve was legendary and whose su
preme rule was secrecy.
The event, in fact, was really unusual. On the days dur
ing which Cardinal Ratzinger made himself available for
our conversation, he granted the longest and the most com
plete of his extremely rare interviews. It should be con
sidered that no other personage in the Church - apart from
I the Pope, of course-could answer our questions with
I greater authority. As is known, the Congregation for the
I
Doctrine of the Faith is the instrument through which the
Holy See promotes the deepening of faith and watches
vigilantly over its purity. Accordingly it is the custodian
~roper of Catholic orthodoxy. Not by chance does it occupy
first place on the official list of the Congregations of t~e
Roman Curia. In fact, as Paul VI wrote when he accorded it
~r:cedence over all the others in the post-conciliar reform, it
~s the Congregation which deals with questions of greatest
importance".
Given the uniqueness of the extremely lengthy interview
granted by the "Prefect of the Faith" - and after a perusal
AN lJNl ISUAL ENCOUNTER II
,,f the explid t cuntrnts- one can easily understand why,
",·\th Sl'llle "''nm1~ntltors, interest has been transformed into
p.lssil,t\, into t ht' nee-d to take a stand: for or against-a stand
\vhich, :ll't\ 'rJing to the state of n1ind of the particular jour
tulist, .llsl' lelvts its tnark, positively or negatively, on Car
dinll R~1tzingt•r's outward appearance.
1 Cardinal-style
~JCatforts,
As for n1e-, I knew Cardinal Ratzinger only through his
\vritings. I had never met him personally. Our meeting
took place on August 15, 1984, in that small but celebrated
city Italians call Bressanone and Germans, Brixen. It is one
of the n1ost in1portant historical sites, known to the former
the Alto Adige, to the latter as South Tyrol [Sudtirol]. It
3S
is the site where prince-bishops once resided, the backdrop
of the struggles between popes and emperors, a land of a
friendly and-just as it is today-hostile encounter between
Latin and German culture. Hence an almost symbolic site,
even though it was not deliberately chosen. Why, then,
Bressanone-Brixen?
Some may fancy that the members of the College of Car
dinals, the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, perhaps still
view themselves as princes who, come summer, abandon
their splendid palaces in the Urbs and betake themselves to a
charming vacation spot.
The reality is altogether different in the matter of His
Eminence, Joseph Ratzinger, Cardinal Prefect. He spends
the extremely limited time during which he can escape
Rome's torrid August heat in the not much cooler valley of
Brixen. He does not live there in a villa or in a hotel, but in
a seminary that rents out some rooms at modest rates: a
THE RAT ZINGER REPORT
I2
source of diocesan inco1ne for the maintenance of the
theology students.
Old priests, attracted by this modest and inexpensi
Bavari:~
sun1mer resort, meet in the corridors of the ancient
edifice. Groups of German and Austrian pilgrims meet here
to enjoy a welcome pause in their journey south.
Cardinal Ratzinger lives here, he eats the simple meals pre
pared for him by the Tyrolese Sisters, he sits at table with the
priests vacationing here. He is alone, without the German
secretary he has in Rome. Occasionally he is in the company
of acquaintances who come to visit him from nearby Bavaria.
A young colleague of his in Rome told us of the intense life
of prayer with which he checks the danger of being trans
formed into a bureaucrat who mechanically signs decrees,
who does not concern himself with the humanity of the per
sons involved. "Often", said the young man, "he assembles
us in the chapel of the palace for meditation and common
prayer. He is constantly aware of the need to let our daily,
often thankless work in dealing with the 'pathology of faith'
become firmly rooted in a lived Christianity."
Left/r ig ht; optimism/pessimism
He is a man, then, wholly rooted in a religious life. And it is
only by viewing things from his standpoint that one will
really understand the meaning of what he says. From that
perspective, all those schematic formulations consen;ativel
progressive, right/left which stem from an altogether different
~phere, namely, that of political ideologies, lose their mean
i~g. Hence they are not transferable to the religious perspec
tive which, to speak with Pascal, "is of another order which
surpasses all the rest in depth and height".