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Pope's Address at Ecumenical Meeting "We Must Become One" REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 13, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the address Benedict XVI gave Tuesday during the ecumenical celebration of Vespers in the cathedral of Regensburg. The meeting was attended by representatives of the various churches and ecclesial communities of Bavaria, in particular, representatives of the Lutheran and Orthodox churches. * * * Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ! We are gathered here -- Orthodox Christians, Catholics and Protestants -- to sing together the evening praise of God. At the heart of this liturgy are the Psalms, in which the Old and the New Covenant come together and our prayer is joined to the Israel which believes and lives in hope. This is an hour of gratitude for the fact that we can pray together in this way and, by turning to the Lord, at the same time grow in unity among ourselves. Among those gathered for this evening's Vespers, I would like first to greet warmly the representatives of the Orthodox Church. I have always considered it a special gift of God's Providence that, as a professor at Bonn, I was able to come to know and to love the Orthodox Church, personally as it were, through two young archimandrites, Stylianos Harkianakis and Damaskinos Papandreou, both of whom later became metropolitans. At Regensburg, thanks to the initiative of Bishop Graber, further meetings occurred: during the symposia on the "Spindlhof" and with scholarship students who had studied here. I am happy indeed to recognize some familiar faces and to renew earlier friendships. In a few days time, at Belgrade, the theological dialogue will resume on the fundamental theme of "koinonia" in the two aspects which the First Letter of John indicates to us at the very beginning of its first chapter. Our "koinonia" is above all communion with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit; it is communion with the triune God, made possible by the Lord through his incarnation and the outpouring of the Spirit. This communion with God creates in turn "koinonia" among people, as a participation in the faith of the apostles, and therefore as a communion in faith -- a communion which is "embodied" in the Eucharist and, transcending all boundaries, builds up the one Church (cf. 1 John 1:3). I hope and pray that these discussions will be fruitful and that the communion with the living God which unites us, like our own communion in the faith transmitted by the apostles, will grow in depth and maturity toward that full unity, whereby the world can recognize that Jesus Christ is truly the One sent from God, the Son of God, the Savior of the world (cf. John 17:21). "So that the world may believe," we must become one: The seriousness of this commitment must spur on our dialogue. I also extend warm greetings to our friends of the various traditions stemming from the Reformation. Here too many memories arise in my heart: memories of friends in the Jäger-Stählin circle, who have already passed away, and these memories are mixed with gratitude for our present meetings. Obviously, I think in particular of the demanding efforts to reach a consensus on justification. I recall all the stages of that process up, to the memorable meeting with the late Bishop Hanselmann here in Regensburg -- a meeting that contributed decisively to the achievement of the conclusion. I am pleased to see that in the meantime the World Methodist Council has adhered to the Declaration. The agreement on justification remains an important task, one not yet fully complete: In theology justification is an essential theme, but in the life of the faithful today -- it seems to me -- it is only dimly present. Because of the dramatic events of our time, the theme of mutual forgiveness is felt with increased urgency, yet there is little perception of our fundamental need of God's forgiveness, of our justification by him. Our modern consciousness in general is no longer aware of the fact that we stand as debtors before God and that sin is a reality which can be overcome only by God's initiative. Behind this weakening of the theme of justification and of the forgiveness of sins is ultimately a weakening of our relation with God. In this sense, our first task will perhaps be to rediscover in a new way the living God present in our lives. Let us now hear what St. John was saying to us a moment ago in the biblical reading. I wish to stress three statements present in this complex and rich text. The central theme of the whole letter appears in verse 15: "Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God." Once again John spells out, as he had done before in verses 2 and 3 of Chapter 4, the profession of faith, the "confessio," which ultimately distinguishes us as Christians: faith in the fact that Jesus is the Son of God who has come in the flesh. "No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known"; so we read at the end of the prologue of the Fourth Gospel (John 1:18). We know who God is through Jesus Christ, the only one who is God. It is through him that we come into contact with God. In this time of interreligious encounters we are easily tempted to attenuate somewhat this central confession or indeed even to hide it. But by doing this we do not do a service to encounter or dialogue. We only make God less accessible to others and to ourselves. It is important that we bring to the conversation not fragments, but the whole image of God. To be able to do so, our personal communion with Christ and our love of him must grow and deepen. In this common confession, and in this common task, there is no division between us. And we pray that this shared foundation will grow ever stronger. And so we have arrived at the second point which I would like to consider. This is found in verse 14, where we read: "And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son as the Savior of the world." The central word in this sentence is we bear witness, we are witnesses. The Profession of Faith must become witness. The root word "martyr" brings to mind the fact that a witness of Jesus Christ must affirm by his whole existence, in life and death, the testimony he gives. The author of the Letter says of himself: "We have seen" (cf. 1:1). Because he has seen, he can be a witness. This presupposes that we also -- succeeding generations -- are capable of seeing, and can bear witness as people who have seen. Let us pray to the Lord that we may see! Let us help one another to develop this capacity, so that we can assist the people of our time to see, so that they in turn, through the world fashioned by themselves, will discover God! Across all the historical barriers may they perceive Jesus anew, the Son sent by God, in whom we see the Father. In verse 9 it is written that God has sent his Son into the world so that we might have life. Is it not the case today that only through an encounter with Jesus Christ can life become really life? To be a witness of Jesus Christ means above all to bear witness to a certain way of living. In a world full of confusion we must again bear witness to the standards that make life truly life. This important task, common to all Christians, must be faced with determination. It is the responsibility of Christians, now, to make visible the standards that indicate a just life, which have been clarified for us in Jesus Christ. He has taken up into his life all the words of Scripture: "Listen to him" (Mark 9:7). And so we come to the third word, of our text (1 John 4:9), which I wish to stress: "agape" -- love. This is the keyword of the whole letter and particularly of the passage which we have heard. Agape does not mean something sentimental or something grandiose; it is something totally sober and realistic. I attempted to explain something of this in my encyclical, "Deus Caritas Est." Agape (love) is really the synthesis of the Law and the prophets. In love everything is "fulfilled"; but this everything must daily be "filled out." In verse 16 of our text we find the marvelous phrase: "We know and believe the love God has for us." Yes, man can believe in love. Let us bear witness to our faith in such a way that it shines forth as the power of love, "so that the world may believe" (John 17:21). Amen! [Translation released by the Holy See; adapted] © Copyright 2006 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Papal Address at Basilica in Regensburg "Solemn Sacred Music an Important Means of Participation in Worship" REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 13, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the address Benedict XVI delivered today in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Old Chapel ("Alte Kapelle"), of which his brother, Monsignor Georg Ratzinger, was director. During the visit, the Pope blessed the new organ. * * * This venerable house of God, the Basilica of "Our Lady of the Old Chapel," has been splendidly refurbished and today receives a new organ, which will now be blessed and solemnly dedicated to its proper aim: the glorification of God and the strengthening of faith. An important contribution to the renewal of sacred music in the 19th century was made by a canon of this collegiate church, Carl Joseph Proske. Gregorian chant and classic choral polyphony were integrated into the liturgy. The attention given to liturgical sacred music in the "Old Chapel" was so significant that it reached far beyond the confines of the region, making Regensburg a center for the reform of sacred music, and its influence has continued to the present time. In the constitution on sacred liturgy of the Second Vatican Council ("Sacrosanctum Concilium"), it is emphasized that the "combination of sacred music and words … forms a necessary or integral part of the solemn liturgy" (No. 112). This means that music and song are more than an embellishment of worship; they are themselves part of the liturgical action. Solemn sacred music, with choir, organ, orchestra and the singing of the people, is not an addition of sorts that frames the liturgy and makes it more pleasing, but an important means of active participation in worship. The organ has always been considered, and rightly so, the king of musical instruments, because it takes up all the sounds of creation and gives resonance to the fullness of human sentiments. By transcending the merely human sphere, as all music of quality does, it evokes the divine. The organ's great range of timbre, from "piano" through to a thundering "fortissimo," makes it an instrument superior to all others. It is capable of echoing and expressing all the experiences of human life. The manifold possibilities of the organ in some way remind us of the immensity and the magnificence of God. Psalm 150 speaks of trumpets and flutes, of harps and zithers, cymbals and drums; all these musical instruments are called to contribute to the praise of the triune God. In an organ, the many pipes and voices must form a unity. If here or there something becomes blocked, if one pipe is out of tune, this may at first be perceptible only to a trained ear. But if more pipes are out of tune, dissonance ensues and the result is unbearable. Also, the pipes of this organ are exposed to variations of temperature and subject to wear. Now, this is an image of our community. Just as in an organ an expert hand must constantly bring disharmony back to consonance, so we in the Church, in the variety of our gifts and charisms, always need to find anew, through our communion in faith, harmony in the praise of God and in fraternal love. The more we allow ourselves, through the liturgy, to be transformed in Christ, the more we will be capable of transforming the world, radiating Christ's goodness, his mercy and his love for others. The great composers, each in his own way, ultimately sought to glorify God by their music. Johann Sebastian Bach wrote above the title of many of his musical compositions the letters S.D.G., "Soli Deo Gloria" -- to God alone be glory. Anton Bruckner also prefaced his compositions with the words: "Dem lieben Gott gewidmet" -- dedicated to the good God. May all those who enter this splendid basilica, experiencing the magnificence of its architecture and its liturgy, enriched by solemn song and the harmony of this new organ, be brought to the joy of faith. [Translation issued by the Holy See; adapted] © Copyright 2006 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Pontiff Points to 3 Keys for Ecumenical Progress Confession of Faith, Witness and Love REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 13, 2006 (Zenit.org).- The three keys to making progress on the way to Christian unity are "confession" of Christ, witness and love, Benedict XVI said at an ecumenical gathering in Bavaria. At the celebration of Vespers on Tuesday in the cathedral of Regensburg, attended by representatives of the Lutheran and Orthodox churches in Bavaria, the Pope highlighted the two key achievements of recent times. Those are: the signing by Catholics and Lutherans of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification and the resumption of the theological dialogue between Catholics and Orthodox. Looking toward the future of the ecumenical journey, the Holy Father reflected on the fourth chapter of the First Letter of St. John, which shortly before had resonated in the cathedral of Regensburg. First, the Apostle John presents that which differentiates Christians: "the profession of faith, that is, the 'confessio,' which ultimately distinguishes us as Christians: faith in the fact that Jesus is the Son of God who has come in the flesh." "In this time of interreligious encounters we are easily tempted to attenuate somewhat this central confession or indeed even to hide it," cautioned Benedict XVI. "But by doing this we do not do a service to encounter or dialogue. We only make God less accessible to others and to ourselves. "It is important that we bring to the conversation not fragments, but the whole image of God. To be able to do so, our personal communion with Christ and our love of him must grow and deepen. In this common confession, and in this common task, there is no division between us. And we pray that this shared foundation will grow ever stronger." Across barriers Second, the Pope explained, this profession of faith in Christ, the only Savior of the human being, "must become witness." The witness of Christians of the various communities must lead their contemporaries "across all the historical barriers … [to] perceive Jesus anew, the Son sent by God, in whom we see the Father," the Holy Father said. "To be a witness of Jesus Christ means above all to bear witness to a certain way of living. "In a world full of confusion we must again bear witness to the standards that make life truly life. This important task, common to all Christians, must be faced with determination. It is the responsibility of Christians, now, to make visible the standards that indicate a just life, which have been clarified for us in Jesus Christ." And third, the Bishop of Rome presented the word "agape" -- love -- as key in the advance toward full Christian unity. In this connection, Benedict XVI recalled the passage of the New Testament on which he was commenting: "'We know and believe the love God has for us.' Yes, man can believe in love. Let us bear witness to our faith in such a way that it shines forth as the power of love, 'so that the world may believe.'"

Papal Address at University of Regensburg "Three Stages in the Program of De-Hellenization" REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the address Benedict XVI delivered to scientists at the University of Regensburg, where he was a professor and vice rector from 1969 to 1971. This is the version the Pope read, adding some allusions of the moment, which he hopes to publish in the future, complete with footnotes. Hence, the present text must be considered provisional. * * * Faith, Reason and the University Memories and Reflections Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen, It is a moving experience for me to stand and give a lecture at this university podium once again. I think back to those years when, after a pleasant period at the Freisinger Hochschule, I began teaching at the University of Bonn. This was in 1959, in the days of the old university made up of ordinary professors. The various chairs had neither assistants nor secretaries, but in recompense there was much direct contact with students and in particular among the professors themselves. We would meet before and after lessons in the rooms of the teaching staff. There was a lively exchange with historians, philosophers, philologists and, naturally, between the two theological faculties. Once a semester there was a "dies academicus," when professors from every faculty appeared before the students of the entire university, making possible a genuine experience of "universitas": The reality that despite our specializations which at times make it difficult to communicate with each other, we made up a whole, working in everything on the basis of a single rationality with its various aspects and sharing responsibility for the right use of reason -- this reality became a lived experience. The university was also very proud of its two theological faculties. It was clear that, by inquiring about the reasonableness of faith, they too carried out a work which is necessarily part of the "whole" of the "universitas scientiarum," even if not everyone could share the faith which theologians seek to correlate with reason as a whole. This profound sense of coherence within the universe of reason was not troubled, even when it was once reported that a colleague had said there was something odd about our university: It had two faculties devoted to something that did not exist: God. That even in the face of such radical skepticism it is still necessary and reasonable to raise the question of God through the use of reason, and to do so in the context of the tradition of the Christian faith: This, within the university as a whole, was accepted without question. I was reminded of all this recently, when I read the edition by professor Theodore Khoury (Muenster) of part of the dialogue carried on -- perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara -- by the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus and an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam, and the truth of both. It was probably the emperor himself who set down this dialogue, during the siege of Constantinople between 1394 and 1402; and this would explain why his arguments are given in greater detail than the responses of the learned Persian. The dialogue ranges widely over the structures of faith contained in the Bible and in the Koran, and deals especially with the image of God and of man, while necessarily returning repeatedly to the relationship of the "three Laws": the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Koran. In this lecture I would like to discuss only one point -- itself rather marginal to the dialogue itself -- which, in the context of the issue of "faith and reason," I found interesting and which can serve as the starting point for my reflections on this issue. In the seventh conversation ("diálesis" -- controversy) edited by professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the jihad (holy war). The emperor must have known that sura 2:256 reads: "There is no compulsion in religion." It is one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under [threat]. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Koran, concerning holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the "Book" and the "infidels," he turns to his interlocutor somewhat brusquely with the central question on the relationship between religion and violence in general, in these words: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." The emperor goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God is not pleased by blood, and not acting reasonably ("syn logo") is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats.... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death...." The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: Not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality. Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazn went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God's will, we would even have to practice idolatry. As far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of religion is concerned, we find ourselves faced with a dilemma which nowadays challenges us directly. Is the conviction that acting unreasonably contradicts God's nature merely a Greek idea, or is it always and intrinsically true? I believe that here we can see the profound harmony between what is Greek in the best sense of the word and the biblical understanding of faith in God. Modifying the first verse of the Book of Genesis, John began the prologue of his Gospel with the words: "In the beginning was the 'logos.'" This is the very word used by the emperor: God acts with logos. Logos means both reason and word -- a reason which is creative and capable of self-communication, precisely as reason. John thus spoke the final word on the biblical concept of God, and in this word all the often toilsome and tortuous threads of biblical faith find their culmination and synthesis. In the beginning was the logos, and the logos is God, says the Evangelist. The encounter between the biblical message and Greek thought did not happen by chance. The vision of St. Paul, who saw the roads to Asia barred and in a dream saw a Macedonian man plead with him: "Come over to Macedonia and help us!" (cf. Acts 16:6-10) -- this vision can be interpreted as a "distillation" of the intrinsic necessity of a rapprochement between biblical faith and Greek inquiry. In point of fact, this rapprochement had been going on for some time. The mysterious name of God, revealed from the burning bush, a name which separates this God from all other divinities with their many names and declares simply that he is, already presents a challenge to the notion of myth, to which Socrates' attempt to vanquish and transcend myth stands in close analogy. Within the Old Testament, the process which started at the burning bush came to new maturity at the time of the Exile, when the God of Israel, an Israel now deprived of its land and worship, was proclaimed as the God of heaven and earth and described in a simple formula which echoes the words uttered at the burning bush: "I am." This new understanding of God is accompanied by a kind of enlightenment, which finds stark expression in the mockery of gods who are merely the work of human hands (cf. Psalm 115). Thus, despite the bitter conflict with those Hellenistic rulers who sought to accommodate it forcibly to the customs and idolatrous cult of the Greeks, biblical faith, in the Hellenistic period, encountered the best of Greek thought at a deep level, resulting in a mutual enrichment evident especially in the later wisdom literature. Today we know that the Greek translation of the Old Testament produced at Alexandria -- the Septuagint -- is more than a simple (and in that sense perhaps less than satisfactory) translation of the Hebrew text: It is an independent textual witness and a distinct and important step in the history of Revelation, one which brought about this encounter in a way that was decisive for the birth and spread of Christianity. A profound encounter of faith and reason is taking place here, an encounter between genuine enlightenment and religion. From the very heart of Christian faith and, at the same time, the heart of Greek thought now joined to faith, Manuel II was able to say: Not to act "with logos" is contrary to God's nature. In all honesty, one must observe that in the late Middle Ages we find trends in theology which would sunder this synthesis between the Greek spirit and the Christian spirit. In contrast with the so-called intellectualism of Augustine and Thomas, there arose with Duns Scotus a voluntarism which ultimately led to the claim that we can only know God's "voluntas ordinata." Beyond this is the realm of God's freedom, in virtue of which he could have done the opposite of everything he has actually done. This gives rise to positions which clearly approach those of Ibn Hazn and might even lead to the image of a capricious God, who is not even bound to truth and goodness. God's transcendence and otherness are so exalted that our reason, our sense of the true and good, are no longer an authentic mirror of God, whose deepest possibilities remain eternally unattainable and hidden behind his actual decisions. As opposed to this, the faith of the Church has always insisted that between God and us, between his eternal Creator Spirit and our created reason there exists a real analogy, in which unlikeness remains infinitely greater than likeness, yet not to the point of abolishing analogy and its language (cf. Lateran IV). God does not become more divine when we push him away from us in a sheer, impenetrable voluntarism; rather, the truly divine God is the God who has revealed himself as logos and, as logos, has acted and continues to act lovingly on our behalf. Certainly, love "transcends" knowledge and is thereby capable of perceiving more than thought alone (cf. Ephesians 3:19); nonetheless it continues to be love of the God who is logos. Consequently, Christian worship is "logic latreía" -- worship in harmony with the eternal Word and with our reason (cf. Romans 12:1). This inner rapprochement between biblical faith and Greek philosophical inquiry was an event of decisive importance not only from the standpoint of the history of religions, but also from that of world history -- it is an event which concerns us even today. Given this convergence, it is not surprising that Christianity, despite its origins and some significant developments in the East, finally took on its historically decisive character in Europe. We can also express this the other way around: This convergence, with the subsequent addition of the Roman heritage, created Europe and remains the foundation of what can rightly be called Europe. The thesis that the critically purified Greek heritage forms an integral part of Christian faith has been countered by the call for a de-Hellenization of Christianity -- a call which has more and more dominated theological discussions since the beginning of the modern age. Viewed more closely, three stages can be observed in the program of de-Hellenization: Although interconnected, they are clearly distinct from one another in their motivations and objectives. De-Hellenization first emerges in connection with the fundamental postulates of the Reformation in the 16th century. Looking at the tradition of scholastic theology, the Reformers thought they were confronted with a faith system totally conditioned by philosophy, that is to say an articulation of the faith based on an alien system of thought. As a result, faith no longer appeared as a living historical Word but as one element of an overarching philosophical system. The principle of "sola scriptura," on the other hand, sought faith in its pure, primordial form, as originally found in the biblical Word. Metaphysics appeared as a premise derived from another source, from which faith had to be liberated in order to become once more fully itself. When Kant stated that he needed to set thinking aside in order to make room for faith, he carried this program forward with a radicalism that the Reformers could never have foreseen. He thus anchored faith exclusively in practical reason, denying it access to reality as a whole. The liberal theology of the 19th and 20th centuries ushered in a second stage in the process of de-Hellenization, with Adolf von Harnack as its outstanding representative. When I was a student, and in the early years of my teaching, this program was highly influential in Catholic theology too. It took as its point of departure Pascal's distinction between the God of the philosophers and the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In my inaugural lecture at Bonn in 1959, I tried to address the issue. I will not repeat here what I said on that occasion, but I would like to describe at least briefly what was new about this second stage of de-Hellenization. Harnack's central idea was to return simply to the man Jesus and to his simple message, underneath the accretions of theology and indeed of Hellenization: This simple message was seen as the culmination of the religious development of humanity. Jesus was said to have put an end to worship in favor of morality. In the end he was presented as the father of a humanitarian moral message. The fundamental goal was to bring Christianity back into harmony with modern reason, liberating it, that is to say, from seemingly philosophical and theological elements, such as faith in Christ's divinity and the triune God. In this sense, historical-critical exegesis of the New Testament restored to theology its place within the university: Theology, for Harnack, is something essentially historical and therefore strictly scientific. What it is able to say critically about Jesus is, so to speak, an expression of practical reason and consequently it can take its rightful place within the university. Behind this thinking lies the modern self-limitation of reason, classically expressed in Kant's "Critiques," but in the meantime further radicalized by the impact of the natural sciences. This modern concept of reason is based, to put it briefly, on a synthesis between Platonism (Cartesianism) and empiricism, a synthesis confirmed by the success of technology. On the one hand it presupposes the mathematical structure of matter, its intrinsic rationality, which makes it possible to understand how matter works and use it efficiently: This basic premise is, so to speak, the Platonic element in the modern understanding of nature. On the other hand, there is nature's capacity to be exploited for our purposes, and here only the possibility of verification or falsification through experimentation can yield ultimate certainty. The weight between the two poles can, depending on the circumstances, shift from one side to the other. As strongly positivistic a thinker as J. Monod has declared himself a convinced Platonist/Cartesian. This gives rise to two principles which are crucial for the issue we have raised. First, only the kind of certainty resulting from the interplay of mathematical and empirical elements can be considered scientific. Anything that would claim to be science must be measured against this criterion. Hence the human sciences, such as history, psychology, sociology and philosophy, attempt to conform themselves to this canon of scientificity. A second point, which is important for our reflections, is that by its very nature this method excludes the question of God, making it appear an unscientific or pre-scientific question. Consequently, we are faced with a reduction of the radius of science and reason, one which needs to be questioned. We shall return to this problem later. In the meantime, it must be observed that from this standpoint any attempt to maintain theology's claim to be "scientific" would end up reducing Christianity to a mere fragment of its former self. But we must say more: It is man himself who ends up being reduced, for the specifically human questions about our origin and destiny, the questions raised by religion and ethics, then have no place within the purview of collective reason as defined by "science" and must thus be relegated to the realm of the subjective. The subject then decides, on the basis of his experiences, what he considers tenable in matters of religion, and the subjective "conscience" becomes the sole arbiter of what is ethical. In this way, though, ethics and religion lose their power to create a community and become a completely personal matter. This is a dangerous state of affairs for humanity, as we see from the disturbing pathologies of religion and reason which necessarily erupt when reason is so reduced that questions of religion and ethics no longer concern it. Attempts to construct an ethic from the rules of evolution or from psychology and sociology, end up being simply inadequate. Before I draw the conclusions to which all this has been leading, I must briefly refer to the third stage of de-Hellenization, which is now in progress. In the light of our experience with cultural pluralism, it is often said nowadays that the synthesis with Hellenism achieved in the early Church was a preliminary inculturation which ought not to be binding on other cultures. The latter are said to have the right to return to the simple message of the New Testament prior to that inculturation, in order to inculturate it anew in their own particular milieux. This thesis is not only false; it is coarse and lacking in precision. The New Testament was written in Greek and bears the imprint of the Greek spirit, which had already come to maturity as the Old Testament developed. True, there are elements in the evolution of the early Church which do not have to be integrated into all cultures. Nonetheless, the fundamental decisions made about the relationship between faith and the use of human reason are part of the faith itself; they are developments consonant with the nature of faith itself. And so I come to my conclusion. This attempt, painted with broad strokes, at a critique of modern reason from within has nothing to do with putting the clock back to the time before the Enlightenment and rejecting the insights of the modern age. The positive aspects of modernity are to be acknowledged unreservedly: We are all grateful for the marvelous possibilities that it has opened up for mankind and for the progress in humanity that has been granted to us. The scientific ethos, moreover, is the will to be obedient to the truth, and, as such, it embodies an attitude which reflects one of the basic tenets of Christianity. The intention here is not one of retrenchment or negative criticism, but of broadening our concept of reason and its application. While we rejoice in the new possibilities open to humanity, we also see the dangers arising from these possibilities and we must ask ourselves how we can overcome them. We will succeed in doing so only if reason and faith come together in a new way, if we overcome the self-imposed limitation of reason to the empirically verifiable, and if we once more disclose its vast horizons. In this sense theology rightly belongs in the university and within the wide-ranging dialogue of sciences, not merely as a historical discipline and one of the human sciences, but precisely as theology, as inquiry into the rationality of faith. Only thus do we become capable of that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today. In the Western world it is widely held that only positivistic reason and the forms of philosophy based on it are universally valid. Yet the world's profoundly religious cultures see this exclusion of the divine from the universality of reason as an attack on their most profound convictions. A reason which is deaf to the divine and which relegates religion into the realm of subcultures is incapable of entering into the dialogue of cultures. At the same time, as I have attempted to show, modern scientific reason with its intrinsically Platonic element bears within itself a question which points beyond itself and beyond the possibilities of its methodology. Modern scientific reason quite simply has to accept the rational structure of matter and the correspondence between our spirit and the prevailing rational structures of nature as a given, on which its methodology has to be based. Yet the question why this has to be so is a real question, and one which has to be remanded by the natural sciences to other modes and planes of thought -- to philosophy and theology. For philosophy and, albeit in a different way, for theology, listening to the great experiences and insights of the religious traditions of humanity, and those of the Christian faith in particular, is a source of knowledge, and to ignore it would be an unacceptable restriction of our listening and responding. Here I am reminded of something Socrates said to Phaedo. In their earlier conversations, many false philosophical opinions had been raised, and so Socrates says: "It would be easily understandable if someone became so annoyed at all these false notions that for the rest of his life he despised and mocked all talk about being -- but in this way he would be deprived of the truth of existence and would suffer a great loss." The West has long been endangered by this aversion to the questions which underlie its rationality, and can only suffer great harm thereby. The courage to engage the whole breadth of reason, and not the denial of its grandeur -- this is the program with which a theology grounded in biblical faith enters into the debates of our time. "Not to act reasonably (with logos) is contrary to the nature of God," said Manuel II, according to his Christian understanding of God, in response to his Persian interlocutor. It is to this great logos, to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures. To rediscover it constantly is the great task of the university. [Translation of German original issued by the Holy See; adapted] © Copyright 2006 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Benedict XVI's Homily at Mass in Regensburg "What Does It Mean to Have Faith?" REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the homily Benedict XVI delivered today during the Mass celebrated in the Islinger Feld park near Regensburg, attended by some 250,000 people. * * * "Those who believe are never alone." This is the theme of these days. Here we can see how true it is. Faith brings us together and gives us a reason to celebrate. It gives us joy in God, joy in his creation, joy in being together. I realize that this celebration required much time and effort to prepare. By reading newspaper accounts, I had some idea of how many people gave their time and energy to do such a fine job of readying this esplanade. Thanks to them, we have the cross here on the hill as a sign of God's peace in the world; the access roads have been cleared; security and good order have been ensured; housing has been provided, and so much more. I could not have imagined -- and even now I am only beginning to imagine -- how much work, down to the smallest details, was needed for us to meet here today. For all this I can only say, in a word: "Heartfelt thanks!" May the Lord repay you for everything you have done, and may the joy which we can now experience as a result of your preparations return a hundredfold to each of you! I was very moved when I heard how many people, especially from the vocational schools of Weiden and Hamburg, and how many firms and individuals, men and women, helped to make my house and my garden a little more beautiful. I am a bit taken aback by all this goodness, and once again I can only offer an inadequate "thank you!" for all your efforts. You have not done all this for just one person; you have done it in a spirit of solidarity in faith, inspired by love of the Lord and his Church. All this is a sign of true humanity, born of our experience of the love of Jesus Christ. We are gathered for a celebration of faith. But the question immediately arises: What do we actually believe? What does it mean to have faith? Is it still something possible in the modern world? When we look at the great "Summae" of theology compiled in the Middle Ages, or we think of the number of books written each day for or against faith, we might lose heart and think that it is all too complicated. In the end, we can no longer see the forest for the trees. True enough: Faith's vision embraces heaven and earth; past, present and future; eternity -- and so it can never be fully exhausted. And yet, deep down, it is quite simple. The Lord tells us so when he says to the Father: "you have revealed these things to the simple -- to those able to see with their hearts" (cf. Matthew 11:25). The Church, for her part, has given us a little "Summa" in which everything essential is expressed. It is the so-called Apostles' Creed, which is usually divided into 12 articles, corresponding to the Twelve Apostles. It speaks of God, the creator and source of all that is, of Christ and his work of salvation, and it culminates in the resurrection of the dead and life everlasting. In its basic structure, the creed is composed of only three main sections, and as we see from its history, it is merely an expansion of the formula for baptism which the risen Lord entrusted to his disciples for all time when he told them: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 28:19). Once we realize this, two things become clear. First, faith is simple. We believe in God -- in God, who is the Beginning and End of human life. We believe in a God who enters into a relationship with us human beings, who is our origin and future. Consequently, faith is, always and inseparably, hope: the certainty that we have a future and will not end up as nothing. And faith is love, since God's love is "contagious." A second thing also becomes clear: The creed is not a collection of propositions; it is not a theory. It is anchored in the event of baptism -- a genuine encounter between God and man. In the mystery of baptism, God stoops to meet us; he comes close to us and brings us in turn closer to each other. Baptism means that Jesus Christ adopts us as his brothers and sisters, welcoming us as sons and daughters into God's own family. He thus makes us one great family in the universal communion of the Church. Truly, those who believe are never alone. God comes to meet us. Let us go out to meet God and so meet one another! To the extent we can, let us make sure that none of God's children ever feels alone! We believe in God. This is a fundamental decision on our part. But is such a thing still possible today? Is it reasonable? From the Enlightenment on, science, at least in part, has applied itself to seeking an explanation of the world in which God would be unnecessary. And if this were so, he would also become unnecessary in our lives. But whenever the attempt seemed to be nearing success -- inevitably it would become clear: Something is missing from the equation! When God is subtracted, something doesn't add up for man, the world, the whole vast universe. So we end up with two alternatives. What came first? Creative Reason, the Spirit who makes all things and gives them growth, or Unreason, which, lacking any meaning, yet somehow brings forth a mathematically ordered cosmos, as well as man and his reason. The latter, however, would then be nothing more than a chance result of evolution and thus, in the end, equally meaningless. As Christians, we say: "I believe in God the Father, the Creator of heaven and earth" -- I believe in the Creator Spirit. We believe that at the beginning of everything is the eternal Word, with Reason and not Unreason. With this faith we have no reason to hide, no fear of ending up in a dead end. We rejoice that we can know God! And we try to let others see the reasonableness of our faith, as St. Peter bids us do in his First Letter (cf. 3:15)! We believe in God. This is what the main sections of the creed affirm, especially the first section. But another question now follows: in what God? Certainly we believe in the God who is Creator Spirit, creative Reason, the source of everything that exists, including ourselves. The second section of the creed tells us more. This creative Reason is Goodness, it is Love. It has a face. God does not leave us groping in the dark. He has shown himself to us as a man. In his greatness he has let himself become small. "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father," Jesus says (John 14:9). God has taken on a human face. He has loved us even to the point of letting himself be nailed to the cross for our sake, in order to bring the sufferings of mankind to the very heart of God. Today, when we have learned to recognize the pathologies and the life-threatening diseases associated with religion and reason, and the ways that God's image can be destroyed by hatred and fanaticism, it is important to state clearly the God in whom we believe, and to proclaim confidently that this God has a human face. Only this can free us from being afraid of God -- which is ultimately at the root of modern atheism. Only this God saves us from being afraid of the world and from anxiety before the emptiness of life. Only by looking to Jesus Christ does our joy in God come to fulfillment and become redeemed joy. During this solemn Eucharistic celebration, let us look to the Lord and ask him to give us the immense joy which he promised to his disciples (cf. John 16:24)! The second section of the creed ends by speaking of the last judgment and the third section by speaking of the resurrection of the dead. Judgment -- doesn't this word also make us afraid? On the other hand, doesn't everyone want to see justice eventually rendered to all those who were unjustly condemned, to all those who suffered in life, who died after lives full of pain? Don't we want the outrageous injustice and suffering which we see in human history to be finally undone, so that in the end everyone will find happiness, and everything will be shown to have meaning? This triumph of justice, this joining together of the many fragments of history which seem meaningless and giving them their place in a bigger picture in which truth and love prevail: This is what is meant by the concept of universal judgment. Faith is not meant to instill fear; Rather it is meant -- surely -- to call us to accountability. We are not meant to waste our lives, misuse them, or spend them selfishly. In the face of injustice we must not remain indifferent and thus end up as silent collaborators or outright accomplices. We need to recognize our mission in history and to strive to carry it out. What is needed is not fear, but responsibility -- responsibility and concern for our own salvation, and for the salvation of the whole world. But when responsibility and concern tend to bring on fear, then we should remember the words of St. John: "My little ones, I am writing this to keep you from sin. But if anyone should sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one" (1 John 2:1). "No matter what our hearts may charge us with -- God is greater than our hearts and all is known to him" (ibid., 3:20). Today we celebrate the feast of the "Most Holy Name of Mary." To all those women who bear that name -- my own mother and my sister were among them -- I offer my heartfelt good wishes for their feast day. Mary, the Mother of the Lord, has received from the faithful the title of Advocate, for she is our advocate before God. And this is how we see her, from the wedding-feast of Cana onward: as a woman who is kindly, filled with maternal concern and love, a woman who is attentive to the needs of others and, out of desire to help them, brings those needs before the Lord. In today's Gospel we have heard how the Lord gave Mary as a Mother to the beloved disciple and, in him, to all of us. In every age, Christians have received with gratitude this legacy of Jesus, and, in their recourse to his Mother, they have always found the security and confident hope which gives them joy in God. May we too receive Mary as the lodestar guiding our lives, introducing us into the great family of God! Truly, those who believe are never alone. Amen! [Translation of German original issued by the Holy See; adapted] © Copyright 2006 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Iraqi Priest Released After 4-Week Captivity BAGHDAD, Iraq, SEPT. 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- The patriarch of Babylon of the Chaldeans confirmed that Father Hanna Saad Sirop, kidnapped in Baghdad on Aug. 15, was released. "Father Hanna is well, he is at home and at last will now be able to resume his work in the Baghdad parish," Patriarch Emmanuel III Delly told the Missionary International Service News Agency. The circumstances of his release Monday are still unknown. "He has been released and is well; this is the only thing that matters now," said the Chaldean patriarch, expressing gratitude "to all those who mobilized to obtain Father Hanna's release." On Aug. 15, the solemnity of the Assumption, Father Sirop, 34, was returning home after celebrating Mass in St. Jacob's Church in the Al Dora district of Baghdad, when he was seized by three gunmen. Days later, Benedict XVI expressed his closeness to the suffering of Iraqi victims and appealed to the kidnappers for the priest's release. The apostolic nunciature of Baghdad confirmed on Tuesday, through AsiaNews.it, the release of the priest, whose mother "rushed back to Baghdad," to embrace her son. Father Sirop is responsible for the theological section of Babel College, run by the Catholic Church in Baghdad.

Pope Gives His Cardinal's Ring to Mary at Altoetting Presents It at 14th-Century Image of the Black Virgin ALTOETTING, Germany, SEPT. 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI gave his cardinal's ring to the Black Virgin of Altoetting, at the most famous shrine of Germany and the "religious heart" of Bavaria. The Holy Father made the gesture Monday. As Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger, he received the cardinal's ring in 1977 from Pope Paul VI, who named him cardinal of Munich. Vatican sources said that the ring was kept by the Holy Father's brother Georg, 82, who is also a priest and who lives in Regensburg. Monsignor Georg Ratzinger gave the Pope the ring on Monday, to give to the Blessed Virgin, to whom he is very devoted. Benedict XVI feels very much linked to Altoetting, which is 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Marktl-am-Inn, his birthplace. The Ratzinger family often visited the shrine, and the Pope once said that he had the good fortune to be able to visit the church regularly, especially the Chapel of Graces (Gnadenkapelle), where the Black Virgin is venerated. The image of the Black Virgin is a small wood carving, so named because it has been blackened over the centuries by the smoke of the votive candles lit by the faithful. The statue of the Blessed Virgin dates back to 1330. The shrine, visited annually by 1 million people, is famous for two apparitions of the Virgin in 1489. The chapel at the shrine houses a silver urn with the hearts of all the Bavarian kings. The first thing the Holy Father did when arriving in Altoetting was to prostrate himself at the foot of the Blessed Virgin.

Faith Doesn't Cause Fear But Joy, Says Pontiff 250,000 Attend Outdoor Mass in Regensburg REGENSBURG, Germany, SEPT. 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Faith does not cause fear; rather, it is the source of genuine joy and celebration because "those who believe are never alone," Benedict XVI said at a large outdoor Mass. Some 250,000 people gathered today in the Islinger Feld park -- some had spent the night there -- to show their affection for the Pope who was at one time professor and vice rector of the University of Regensburg. Benedict XVI, on the fourth day of his visit to his native Bavaria, dedicated his homily to a catechesis on the heart of the Christian faith as the answer to the anxieties of contemporary men and women. "Today," he said, "when we have learned to recognize the pathologies and the life-threatening diseases associated with religion and reason, and the ways that God's image can be destroyed by hatred and fanaticism, it is important to state clearly the God in whom we believe, and to proclaim confidently that this God has a human face." "Faith is simple," the Holy Father said, presenting the creed as that "Summae" of theology in which all the essential is expressed. "We believe in God -- in God, who is the Beginning and End of human life," he stated. "We believe in a God who enters into a relationship with us human beings, who is our origin and future. Consequently, faith is, always and inseparably, hope: the certainty that we have a future and will not end up as nothing. And faith is love, since God's love is 'contagious.'" Anchored in baptism The Holy Father clarified: "The creed is not a collection of propositions; it is not a theory. "It is anchored in the event of baptism -- a genuine encounter between God and man. In the mystery of baptism, God stoops to meet us; he comes close to us and brings us in turn closer to each other. "Baptism means that Jesus Christ adopts us as his brothers and sisters, welcoming us as sons and daughters into God's own family. He thus makes us one great family in the universal communion of the Church." Benedict XVI continued: "Truly, those who believe are never alone," echoing the theme of his fourth international apostolic trip. "God comes to meet us. Let us go out to meet God and so meet one another! To the extent we can, let us make sure that none of God's children ever feels alone!" he exclaimed. "We believe in God. This is a fundamental decision on our part. "But is such a thing still possible today? Is it reasonable? From the Enlightenment on, science, at least in part, has applied itself to seeking an explanation of the world in which God would be unnecessary. And if this were so, he would also become unnecessary in our lives. "But whenever the attempt seemed to be nearing success -- inevitably it would become clear: Something is missing from the equation! When God is subtracted, something doesn't add up for man, the world, the whole vast universe." What's first? "So we end up with two alternatives," the Pope observed. "What came first? Creative Reason, the Spirit who makes all things and gives them growth, or Unreason, which, lacking any meaning, yet somehow brings forth a mathematically ordered cosmos, as well as man and his reason. "The latter, however, would then be nothing more than a chance result of evolution and thus, in the end, equally meaningless. As Christians, we say: 'I believe in God the Father, the Creator of heaven and earth' -- I believe in the Creator Spirit. "We believe that at the beginning of everything is the eternal Word, with Reason and not Unreason. With this faith we have no reason to hide, no fear of ending up in a dead end. We rejoice that we can know God! And we try to let others see the reasonableness of our faith." At the end of the homily, the Holy Father congratulated all the women called Mary, as on Sept. 12 the liturgy celebrates the name of the Mother of God. Mary, Benedict XVI said, was the name of his mother and sister, whose tomb he will visit on Thursday.

Pontiff's Homily to First Communicants and Others "Drink Directly From the Source of Life" MUNICH, Germany, SEPT. 11, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the homily Benedict XVI delivered on Sunday evening in the cathedral in Munich, during the celebration of Vespers attended by first communicants, young families, and pastoral and liturgical collaborators of the Church. * * * Dear First Communicants! Dear Parents and Teachers! The reading we have just heard is from the final book of the New Testament, the Book of Revelation. The seer is helped to lift his eyes upward, toward heaven, and forward, toward the future. But in doing so, he speaks to us about earth, about the present, about our lives. In the course of our lives, all of us are on a journey, we are traveling toward the future. Naturally, we want to find the right road: to find true life, and not a dead end or a desert. We don't want to end up saying: I took the wrong road, my life is a failure, it went wrong. We want to find joy in life; we want, in the words of Jesus, "to have life in abundance." But let us listen to the seer of the Book of Revelation. What is he saying? He is talking about a reconciled world. A world in which people "of every nation, race, people and tongue" (7:9) have come together in joy. How can this happen? What road do we take to get there? First and most important: these people are living with God; God himself has "sheltered them in his tent" (cf. 7:15), as the reading says. What do we mean by "God's tent"? Where is it found? How do we get there? The seer might be alluding to the first chapter of the Gospel according to John, where we read: "The Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us" (1:14). God is not far from us, he is not somewhere out in the universe, somewhere that none of us can go. He has pitched his tent among us: In Jesus he became one of us, flesh and blood just like us. This is his "tent." And in the Ascension, he did not go somewhere far away from us. His tent, he himself in his Body, remains among us and is one of us. We can call him by name and speak at ease with him. He listens to us and, if we are attentive, we can also hear him speaking back. Let me repeat: In Jesus, it is God who "camps" in our midst. But let me also repeat: Where does this happen? Our reading gives us two answers to this question. It says that the men and women at peace "have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (7:14). To us this sounds very strange. In his cryptic language, the seer is speaking about baptism. His words about "the blood of the Lamb" allude to Jesus' love, which he continued to show even up to his violent death. This love, both divine and human, is the bath into which he plunges us at baptism -- the bath with which he washes us, cleansing us so that we can be fit for God and capable of living in his company. The act of baptism, however, is just a beginning. By walking with Jesus, in faith and in our life in union with him, his love touches us, purifies us and enlightens us. For the ancient world, white was the color of light. The white robes mean that in faith we become light, we set aside darkness, falsehood and every sort of evil, and we become people of light, fit for God. The baptismal gown, like your first-Communion robes, is meant to remind us of this, and to tell us: by living as one with Jesus and the community of believers, the Church, you have become a person of light, a person of truth and goodness -- a person radiant with goodness, the goodness of God himself. The second answer to the question: "Where do we find Jesus?" is also given by the seer in cryptic language. He tells us that the Lamb leads the great multitude of people from every culture and nation to the sources of living water. Without water, there is no life. People who lived near the desert knew this well, and so springs of water became for them the symbol par excellence of life. The Lamb, Jesus, leads men and women to the sources of life. Among these sources of life are the sacred Scriptures, in which God speaks to us and teaches us the right way to live. The true source is Jesus himself, in whom God gives us his very self. He does this above all in holy Communion. There we can, as it were, drink directly from the source of life: He comes to us and makes each of us one with him. We can see how true this is: Through the Eucharist, the sacrament of communion, a community is formed which spills over all borders and embraces all languages -- the universal Church, in which God speaks to us and lives among us. This is how we should receive holy Communion: seeing it as an encounter with Jesus, an encounter with God himself, who leads us to the sources of true life. Dear parents! I ask you to help your children to grow in faith, I ask you to accompany them on their journey toward holy Communion, on their journey toward Jesus and with Jesus. Please, go with your children to Church and take part in the Sunday Eucharistic celebration! You will see that this is not time lost; rather, it is the very thing that can keep your family truly united and centered. Sunday becomes more beautiful, the whole week becomes more beautiful, when you go to Sunday Mass together. And please, pray together at home too: at meals and before going to bed. Prayer does not only bring us nearer to God but also nearer to one another. It is a powerful source of peace and joy. Family life becomes more joyful and expansive whenever God is there and his closeness is experienced in prayer. Dear catechists and teachers! I urge you to keep alive in the schools the search for God, for that God who in Jesus Christ has made himself visible to us. I know that in our pluralistic world it is no easy thing in schools to bring up the subject of faith. But it is hardly enough for our children and young people to learn technical knowledge and skills alone, and not the criteria that give knowledge and skill their direction and meaning. Encourage your students not only to raise questions about particular things, but also to ask about the why and the wherefore of life as a whole. Help them to realize that any answers that do not finally lead to God are insufficient. Dear priests and all who assist in parishes! I urge you to do everything possible to make the parish a "spiritual community" for people -- a great family where we also experience the even greater family of the universal Church, and learn through the liturgy, catechesis and all the events of parish life to walk together on the way of true life. These three places of education -- the family, the school and the parish -- go together, and they help us to find the way that leads to the sources of life, toward "life in abundance." Amen! [Translation issued by the Holy See; adapted] © Copyright 2006 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

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