87 of 88 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Insights into the new pope's direction, April 20, 2005
This review is from: Salt of the Earth: The Church at the End of the Millennium- An Interview With Peter Seewald (Paperback)
For those who want a keen insight into the life and formation of the new pope, Benedict XVI, most recently known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, this book is a must read. Most of the text is done as an interview with Peter Seewald, a German journalist, who does a question-and-answer format, but not in a choppy form. The answers are extended reflections, giving ample space to discussion of real, substantive issues of the church and the world.
The first section of the book concentrates on Ratzinger himself; the interview is nearly ten years old now, but the insights are still apropos to the man who is now the pope. Ratzinger did not look at the questions beforehand, and his responses, while not quite off-the-cuff, still have a spontaneity to them that is perhaps at odds with the more conservative image Ratzinger has come to bear. He is a conservative, to be sure, but in these pages along with other books, one may find a bit more compassion and humour than one might expect.
Ratzinger reflects upon his strict upbringing as a child, his time as a child of a 'simple commissioner', and his growth in a devout Catholic family who tended to go to Mass twice on Sundays.
Ratzinger became a theology professor, teaching at the universities at Tubingen and Regensburg. Heidegger is a big influence on Ratzinger's philosophical development, as are notions of Personalism (a philosophy of profound influence on Martin Luther King Jr. among others). Like his predecessor, Ratzinger has a great interest in Phenomenology and other modern philosophical schools. This led him to be a theological advisor to the Second Vatican Council, at which time Ratzinger was classified as a progressive, perhaps even a liberal.
Ratzinger discusses the role of his office, the Sacred Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith (once called The Inquisition), in the development of the 800+ page catechism for the Catholic church. This is a pope who knows the catechism backwards and forwards, for he has been part of the development at every stage.
Most intriguing are his ideas for the future of the church and the state of the world. He doesn't expect some sort of dramatic resurgence of the church, but does see a role and relevance for the church in the world. Perhaps this comes from the power of the church to provoke and be a prophetic witness. Given that his chosen name as pope is Benedict, his comparison in this text with St. Benedict (of monastic fame) is very intriguing. He likens the current and future situation to that of late antiquity, a time in which the majority of the non-ecclesial society wasn't really taking note of what the church was doing - Benedict was a bit of a dropout, who created 'an ark in which the West survived', largely going unnoticed.
For those who see Ratzinger as a knee-jerk traditionalist, perhaps no other statement is more enigmatic than his comment, "Perhaps the time has come to say farewell to the idea of traditionally Catholic cultures."
An intriguing and fascinating read.
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45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gentle German Shepherd, November 5, 2005
This review is from: Salt of the Earth: The Church at the End of the Millennium- An Interview With Peter Seewald (Paperback)
A bumper sticker spotted this week on a mini-van emerging from a parking lot of a Catholic Church:
"I love my German Shepherd!" (beneath it, two words: "Benedict Sixteen.")
I wanted to second that emotion! And it's because of this interview, from ten years ago, which reminds me on its every delightful page, of my all-time favorite such book, from 17 centuries ago (correct) --- one of the treasures of the Eastern Church tradition.
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Back in the fourth century a simple monk named John Cassian went to visit the so-called "Desert Fathers" - many of them saints, who performed miracles of spiritual understanding in the presence of Cassian and his friend Germanus. Cassian's young friend was positively hostile in his questioning of these saintly men. But his often rude and gratingly persistent questions elicited the most amazing replies!
Cassian's resulting book "The Conferences" was strong meat devoured by the first "Saint Benedict" -- who used it as the basis for his monastic order (the very first in the western tradition of the Church). A thousand years later, the greatest of the theologians, Thomas Aquinas kept a copy of "The Conferences" with him at all times, and "read from it every day."
I thought of my ancient hero John Cassian (and especially of his rude companion Germanus) while reading this -- my new favorite book! Published in German in 1996, these 280 pages comprise an interview in 1995 of then-Cardinal Ratzinger.
The interviewer, an agnostic journalist Peter Seewald, repeatedly asks often-hostile questions of a truly great and (I believe) saintly mind. I love the fact that Ratzinger specifically requested he not see any of the questions in advance. The resultant conversation is astonishingly brilliant and satisfyingly deep!
Alas . . . it is impossible (for me at least) to recapitulate such brilliant thought in fewer words. But to single out just one exchange that appealed to this former journalist, who like Mr. Seewald has since converted to this 2,000 year old faith - mainly because of such brilliant and saintly minds.
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Near the end of this book (p. 215) --- in a chapter titled "2000 years of Christian history and still no redemption"--- the German journalist poses a rambling, 250 word question --- in fact really a dozen questions all bundled together. To which the German cardinal gently begins unraveling the bundle, with the most astonishingly focused reply. He deals with each implied question-in-turn - (and in the same order he received them; I am in awe of such a mind!)
Ratzinger's reply begins with a gentle dig at the questioner's inability to focus on `one-thing-at-a-time - saying:
"That is quite a bundle of observations and questions! The basic question (buried in the middle) is, `Has Christianity really brought salvation, has it brought redemption, or hasn't it actually remained fruitless? Hasn't Christianity perhaps by now lost its power?'
Ratzinger then proceeds to point out a distinction lost on many of us - including his interviewer:
"I think we must first say that salvation - the kind that comes from God - is not quantitative (like) the sum of an addition. In (science and) technical discoveries, there is growth, which may proceed in fits and starts, but is nonetheless continuous: The purely quantitative is measurable - one can ascertain whether there is now `more' or `less.'
"But a quantifiable progress in human goodness is impossible. Because each (of us) is new - and in a sense, history begins anew with every man. It is very important to learn this distinction."
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Assisting the journalist then (with an endearingly gentle and diplomatic guidance) Ratzinger helps his interviewer re-focus many subsequent questions (which, significantly become ever-more compact).
Eventually Peter Seewald asks a question that helps the reader see in bold relief, the difference between the mind of Ratzinger and that of his predecessor John Paul II (who three times refused to allow Ratzinger to abandon Rome for a more peaceful and secluded retirement in his homeland).
Seewald quotes from "John Paul II's talk to the United Nations" (1995) on the "foundations of a new, world order" -- and his hope for the "third Millennium: `We shall see' said the Pope, `that the tears of this century prepared the ground for a new springtime of the human spirit.' What might be meant by this springtime? A new identity of man?"
Then-Cardinal Ratzinger (ten years away from his own pontificate) replies in a manner that helps us see the principal difference between the world view of the two popes: John Paul II (who philosophically resembles his ideal --Thomas Aquinas) and Benedict Sixteen, (who more closely resembles the original St. Augustine).
Thus, Pope John Paul II (in Ratzinger's words of ten years ago) "does indeed cherish a vision that (the last thousand years of Christianity) - "the `millennium of divisions,' will be followed by the `millennium of unifications.' " The difference is, Ratzinger does NOT see this happening any time soon:
"The emergence of ecumenism at the Second Vatican Council is indeed a sign of a renewed approach to a new unity. It is thus filled with the hope . . . that all the catastrophes of our century, `all its tears,' as the Pope says, will be caught up at the end and turned into a new beginning."
It is good, the future pope said that we have such visions: "This is a vision that inspires and that challenges us to move in this direction. The Pope's untiring activity comes precisely from his visionary power. It would be fatal if we let ourselves be guided by purely negative calculations --- if we didn't allow ourselves to be guided by (such visions) that then give us guidelines and courage for action.
"(However) whether the vision is actually fulfilled is something we must leave entirely in God's hands. At the moment, I do not yet see it approaching."
As a former interviewer, I must add that this interview is quite simply the most amazing (and intellectually pleasurable) that I have ever read.
Mark Blackburn
Winnipeg
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