The Wolves are at the Door!
The launch of an inquiry by German Catholic officials has prompted more venom from the world’s press to be directed at the Holy Father.
The inquiry concerns the Pope’s 86 year old brother who admitted he slapped children years ago when “the slapping of students and other forms of corporal punishment were common in Catholic schools in Germany and other countries in that era.” [as it was in most schools of most countries of the world]
“There is certainly the suspicion that there are some out there out to damage the church and the pope,” said a Vatican official, speaking anonymously because of the sensitivity of the matter”.
All this was happening whilst the Holy Father was holding his usual Wednesday General Audience [Wednesday, March 10, 2010]. in which he is reported as stating publicly the fundamental principle explaining his own papacy.
In this General Audience the Pope said that the essence of his task in governing the Church, is to orient souls to Christ, to “win souls for Christ”.
Benedict suggested that he is guiding the Church just as Bonaventure tried to guide the Franciscan Order in the late 1200s, “not only through commands and structures, but through guiding and enlightening souls, orienting them to Christ.”
This is said to be the center of Benedict’s pontificate [which it is also claimed] that his opponents are trying to conceal, and overshadow, with allegations of scandal.The Pope also said the following in this audience:
“We know, in fact, how after the Second Vatican Council, some were convinced that everything should be new, that there should be another Church, that the pre-conciliar Church was finished and that we would have another, totally “other” Church. An anarchic utopianism!
And thanks be to God, the wise helmsmen of Peter’s Barque, Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II, on one hand defended the novelty of the council and on the other, at the same time, defended the uniqueness and continuity of the Church, which is always a Church of sinners and always a place of grace…
Dear friends, let us take up the invitation addressed to us by St. Bonaventure, the Seraphic Doctor, and let us enter the school of the divine Teacher: We listen to his Word of life and truth, which resounds in the depth of our soul. Let us purify our thoughts and actions, so that he can dwell in us, and we can hear his divine voice, which draws us toward true happiness.” Pope Benedict XVI, General Audience, Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Acknowledgment to Robert Moynihan of Inside the Vatican.
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