RBWords - Volume 21 - Number 4: April 2008
Something to Think About
r. b. words
volume 21 – number 4
april 2008
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT - The recent visit of Pope Benedict XVI to our country has given me a lot to think about. I watched more of the television coverage of this visit than I had done for any of Pope John Paul II\'s visits. I\'m not sure why that was so except that Benedict XVI has been more of a mystery to me. I think I learned a bit more of the man that the Cardinal-electors saw when they elected him pope. It wasn\'t because of his zeal as head of the doctrinal congregation but because they saw that “kinder, gentler” guy that so many of us saw on the screen and others (including the abuse victims) met in person during his visit. I marveled at his stamina as well. He is an octogenarian and yet he managed to keep a schedule that would have exhausted someone twenty years younger than he. His clear delight at the meeting with youth was inspiring. There was no finger-wagging moralizing either in his remarks to them. (Not that JPII did that. Folks might have wondered about B16\'s approach, however.) His meeting with the victims of clergy sex abuse did a lot to bring some calm and much needed healing not only to the victims who met him but to all who suffered in this way AND to the 96% of the clergy in this country who are not abusers of children. All of his presentations that I saw or read later showed a calm and principled approach that showed his scholarly/pastoral traits. He was (is) not a stage presence as JPII was. He was a visiting grandparent or elder!
At the moment, it is difficult to know what the long term impact of his visit will be. For the moment, it is sufficient to acknowledge that his visit was a very positive experience not just for him or for Catholics, but for everyone in this land – and through the United Nations – in other lands as well. IT IS SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
It Has Been Said
Dear friends, truth is not an imposition. Nor is it simply a set of rules. It is a discovery of the One who never fails us; the One whom we can always trust. In seeking truth we come to live by belief because ultimately truth is a person: Jesus Christ. That is why authentic freedom is not an opting out. It is an opting in; nothing less than letting go of self and allowing oneself to be drawn into Christ’s very being for others (cf. Spe Salvi, 28).
Pope Benedict XVI: Address to Young People and Seminarians