Pope Benedict XVI's Words in Austria
Sorry I am only now looking at what the Holy Father said during his journey to Austria. Usually, I do that in the course of each papal journey. Yesterday and today, I was faced with both a lack of time and my own feelings over our diocese's settlement of its sex abuse claims on Friday. Hopefully, although at the end of the evening, this will make up for the delay with worthwhile summaries of the Holy Father's words from this journey.
For anyone who was not able to watch one of the events on EWTN (there is one more EWTN broadcast of today's Mass, by the way), I will link to the KTO archive videos of some of the events. The commentary is in French. Even if you do not understand the French, you can hear the music and watch the liturgy and see the Holy Father and the reaction of the people. Click on "Regarder la Video." You may get a better picture on Real Player by then clicking on "Si aucune video ne s'affiche, cliquez ici."
The official Vatican page on the visit has links to the official translations of the Holy Father's words in Austria.
Words on the Airplane
Teresa Benedetta has a translation of the Pope's words prior to his flight's take off to Vienna, in a rush translation at Papa Ratzinger Forum. The Pope responded to four questions collected in advance by Fr. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesperson.
He said he wanted to go to Mariazell as a pilgrim among pilgrims, to pray among others who pray there. He also spoke of it as a sign of unity of the faith, unity across time over the 850 years of the shrine, and "a symbol of the unifying power that comes from faith, the power of reconciliation." He spoke of those who have remained faithful to the Church through difficult times, "who in this church of sinners nevertheless recognized the face of Jesus," saying he wanted to "help in healing these wounds."
When asked if he would have a message on international politics, he said that this is "not a political visit, but a pilgrimage," and that it was originally only planned as a pilgrimage to Mariazell, with the other events added afterward. In his meeting with politicians, he said he planned some words on the Christian roots of Europe as a path to follow, but there was no plan for a political appeal. He also said that his meeting with Vienna's Chief Rabbi at the holocaust memorial was intended "to demonstrate our sadness, our repentance, and also our friendship with our Jewish brothers, in order to move forward with this great union that God has created among his people."
Welcome Ceremony at the Vienna Airport
The Vatican has posted its official English translation of the Pope's Address at the Welcome Ceremony, where he was greeted by Austria's president. Pope Benedict gave this explanation of the reason for his journey:
"The reason for my coming to Austria is the 850th anniversary of the shrine of Mariazell. This Marian sanctuary in some way represents the maternal heart of Austria, and has always had a particular importance also for Hungarians and the Slavic peoples. It symbolizes an openness which not only transcends physical and national frontiers, but, in the person of Mary, reminds us of an essential dimension of human beings: their capacity for openness to God and his word of truth."
Prayer at the Mariensäule
The Pope's first stop after leaving the airport was the Mariensäule, a bronze column dedicated to the Virgin. The Vatican official translation includes his greeting and prayer. Benedict explained the monument, which was built by the Emperor Ferdinand III in thanksgiving for the liberation of Vienna 360 years ago, saying that it "must also be a sign of hope for us today." How many people over those 360 years, he asked, have prayed beneath that column, and "have experienced in times of trouble the power of her intercession!"
Here is the prayer at the end:
"Holy Mary, Immaculate Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, in you God has given us the model of the Church and of genuine humanity. To you I entrust the country of Austria and its people. Help all of us to follow your example and to direct our lives completely to God! Grant that, by looking to Christ, we may become ever more like him: true children of God! Then we too, filled with every spiritual blessing, will be able to conform ourselves more fully to his will and to become instruments of his peace for Austria, Europe and the world. Amen."
Remembrance of the Holocaust
The next stop was Vienna's holocaust memorial.
Articles posted in Papa Ratzinger Forum mention that Vienna's Jewish population was once vibrant, the home of 185,000 Jews, which now are only a population of 7,000. Vienna's holocaust memorial is near the city's Judenplatz, where the city's main synagogue is located. There, Benedict was joined by the city's Chief Rabbi Paul Chaim Eisenberg as he stopped for a moment of silent prayer.
Vatican Radio has an audio report describing the memorial and the Pope's meeting with the Chief Rabbi.
Meeting with the Authorities and the Diplomatic Corps
In his address to Austrian political authorities and diplomats, the Pope was true to his comments on the plane that his address was not a political statement. Although he briefly mentioned situations in the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere, his address was essentially one about the Christian roots in Europe's heritage and the importance of Christianity in providing a unified source of values as Europe moves forward toward diversity and globalization. There, the notion of human rights emerged. He also mentioned Europe's distinctive capacity for self-criticism.
He mentioned Europe's need for a solid foundation of common values:
"The “European home”, as we readily refer to the community of this continent, will be a good place to live for everyone only if it is built on a solid cultural and moral foundation of common values drawn from our history and our traditions. Europe cannot and must not deny her Christian roots."
He spoke of a concern for humanity in the value of life in the unborn, the need to support young families having children, and end-of-life issues such as actively assisted death. He presented life issues in the context of Europe's heritage, saying "It was in Europe that the notion of human rights was first formulated. The fundamental human right, the presupposition of every other right, is the right to life itself."
Another aspect of European heritage that he mentioned was "a tradition of thought which considers as essential a substantial correspondence between faith, truth and reason."
He encouraged the European Union to take leadership in fighting global poverty, seeking peace, addressing African tragedies such as AIDS and the situation in Darfur, protection of natural resources, the prevention of arms trafficking, and the promotion of dialogue and peace in the Middle East.
He concluded by speaking of what Austria owes to the Christian faith and what Christianity has done for its people:
"The faith has profoundly shaped the character of this country and its people. Consequently it should be everyone’s concern to ensure that the day will never come when only its stones speak of Christianity! An Austria without a vibrant Christian faith would no longer be Austria."
Homily at Mass at the Mariazell
On Saturday, the Holy Father presided at the Mass honoring the 850th year of the shrine of the Mariazell, on the occasion of its patronal feast, the feast of the Nativity of Mary. He said on the plane was his first reason for going to Austria.
He spoke of the day's Gospel reading for Mass, which is the genealogy of Mary in St. Matthew's Gospel:
"The genealogy with its light and dark figures, its successes and failures, shows us that God can write straight even on the crooked lines of our history. God allows us our freedom, and yet in our failures he can always find new paths for his love. God does not fail. Hence this genealogy is a guarantee of God’s faithfulness; a guarantee that God does not allow us to fall, and an invitation to direct our lives ever anew towards him, to walk ever anew towards Jesus Christ."
He spoke of how we all need a restless, pilgrim's heart like people of Jesus' time, who were seeking "the star which could show them the way towards Truth itself, towards the living God." He spoke of "the attitude of resignation that considers man incapable of truth," which would make it impossible to distinguish between good and evil, and which he said is "at the heart of the crisis" of Europe, making scientific discoveries double-edged. For those who fear that a belief in truth entails intolerance, he suggested looking at the two images of Jesus in the Mariazell:
"We see him here in two images: as the child in his Mother’s arms, and above the high altar of the Basilica as the Crucified. These two images in the Basilica tell us this: truth prevails not through external force, but it is humble and it yields itself to man only via the inner force of its veracity. Truth proves itself in love."
He invoked as a prayer to Mary, "Show us Jesus!" Mary shows him to us first as a child and then as the crucified one. He mentioned the motto for the journey, "To gaze upon Christ," which he said shows that Christianity is not a moral code but rather a life-long friendship with Christ.
Homily at Vespers at the Mariazell
Yesterday evening, the Pope gave another homily at evening prayer at the Basilica of the Mariazell. The Vatican website does not yet have that homily posted in English, but Vatican Radio has it.
Pope Benedict began his evening address with a call for prayer, joining Mary in praising God and commending to her our concerns, including these: "to beg her protection for the Church, to invoke her intercession for the gift of worthy vocations for Dioceses and religious communities, to implore her assistance for families and her merciful prayers for all those longing for freedom from sin and for the grace of conversion, and, finally, to entrust to Mary’s maternal care our sick and our elderly. May the great Mother of Austria and of Europe bring all of us to a profound renewal of faith and life!"
He spoke of the nature of mission and the Kingdom of God:
"At the heart of the mission of Jesus Christ and of every Christian is the proclamation of the Kingdom of God. Proclaiming the Kingdom in the name of Christ means for the Church, for priests, men and women religious, and for all the baptized, a commitment to be present in the world as his witnesses: you testify to a “meaning” rooted in God’s creative love and opposed to every kind of meaninglessness and despair."
He then turned again to his major theme for the visit, "To Gaze on Christ." In looking at Him, he said, the Church considers three particular features of His attitude called the "Evangelical counsels": poverty, chastity and obedience. Pope Benedict then discussed each one of those features, particularly applicable to the lives of priests and religious:
Following Christ in a radical way involves renouncing material goods, but that poverty must be lived "in a way centered on Christ, as a means of becoming inwardly free for God and neighbour."
As for chastity in the lives of priests and religious, he said "they solemnly promise to put completely and unreservedly at the service of God’s Kingdom the deep relationships of which they are capable and which they accept as a gift."
In obedience, he said, "Christians have always known from experience that, in abandoning themselves to the will of the Father, they lose nothing, but instead discover their deepest identity and interior freedom."
Homily from Sunday Mass at St. Stephen's Cathedral
Vatican Radio and Zenit have a Vatican translation of the homily given this morning.
In an eloquent homily on Sunday, Pope Benedict began with an example from the early Church:
"Sine dominico non possumus!" Without the gift of the Lord, without the Lord's day, we cannot live: That was the answer given in the year 304 by Christians from Abitene in present-day Tunisia, when they were caught celebrating the forbidden Sunday Eucharist and brought before the judge. They were asked why they were celebrating the Christian Sunday Eucharist, even though they knew it was a capital offense. . . For these Christians, the Sunday Eucharist was not a commandment, but an inner necessity. Without him who sustains our lives with his love, life itself is empty."
The same thing applies to us today, he said, as we need that relationship with the Risen one who sustains us.
In considering today's Gospel reading for Mass, he said that Jesus does not expect the same thing from everyone. "Each person has a specific task, to each is assigned a particular way of discipleship. In today's Gospel, Jesus is speaking directly of the specific vocation of the Twelve" and to "men and women in every century who have left all else behind for his sake, and have thus become radiant signs of his love."
Moreover, turning again to the Gospel, "the essence of what he says applies to everyone." Whoever loses his life for my sake … ", says the Lord: a radical letting-go of our self is only possible if in the process we end up, not by falling into the void, but into the hands of Love eternal."
Returning more specifically to the importance of Sunday, he said, "Because Sunday is ultimately about encountering the risen Christ in word and sacrament, its span extends through the whole of reality. . . . We ask God to look down with loving-kindness. We ourselves need this look of loving-kindness not only on Sunday but beyond, reaching into our everyday lives. As we ask, we know that this loving gaze has already been granted to us."
Zenit has a Vatican translation of the Pope's words at the noonday Angelus. An excerpt:
"In my homily I wished to say something about the meaning of Sunday and about today's Gospel, and I think that this led us to discover that the love of God, who surrendered himself into our hands for our salvation, gives us the inner freedom to let go of our own lives, in order to find true life. Mary's participation in this love gave her the strength to say "yes" unconditionally."
Remarks at the Cistercian Abbey of Heiligenkreuz
The Holy Father visited a 12th century Cistercian abbey today, the oldest continuously operating Cistercian abbey, known as the Abbey of Heiligenkreuz (Holy Cross). Vatican Radio has an English translation of the text of his address there.
All Christians pray, he said, but in the lives of monks, prayer takes on particular importance. Their lives are lives of men of prayer, and their vocation is worship, and thus their primary service to the world must be their prayer and the celebration of the Divine Office.
In speaking of the Divine Office, the Holy Father remarked on the liturgy:
"Whenever in our thinking we are only concerned about making the liturgy attractive, interesting and beautiful, the battle is already lost. Either it is Opus Dei, with God as its specific subject, or it is not. In the light of this, I ask you to celebrate the sacred liturgy with your gaze fixed on God within the communion of saints, the living Church of every time and place, so that it will truly be an expression of the sublime beauty of the God who has called men and women to be his friends."
About prayer, he said:
"The soul of prayer, ultimately, is the Holy Spirit. Whenever we pray, it is he who “helps us in our weakness, interceding for us with sighs too deep for words” (Rom 8:26). Trusting in these words of the Apostle Paul, I assure you, dear brothers and sisters, that prayer will produce in you the same effect which once led to the custom of calling priests and consecrated persons simply “spirituals” (Geistliche)."
He contrasted our own day with that of twelfth century Cistercian St. Bernard, and yet drew an application from the thought of St. Bernard to the study of theology in our present day:
"In its desire to be recognized as a rigorously scientific discipline in the modern sense, theology can lose the life-breath given by faith. But just as a liturgy which no longer looks to God is already in its death throes, so too a theology which no longer draws its life-breath from faith ceases to be theology; it ends up as a array of more or less loosely connected disciplines. But where theology is practised “on bent knee”, as Hans Urs von Balthasar urged, it will prove fruitful for the Church in Austria and beyond."
There were two more events before the Pope returned to Rome this evening. The first was a meeting with representatives from volunteer organizations at a concert hall. The other was the farewell address at the airport before his return. I could not yet find an English translation of either of those addresses or a good article about his words. I will add more to this post tomorrow when those become available.
Meeting with Volunteers
Vatican Radio has a translation of the text of the Holy Father's address to representatives of volunteer organizations at a concert hall in Vienna as his journey to Austria drew near a close. I especially liked this reference to St. Irenaeus of Lyon and Nicholas of Cusa about the image of God and the dignity of every human being:
"Ladies and Gentlemen! Volunteer work is a service to human dignity, inasmuch as men and women are created in the image and likeness of God. As Irenaeus of Lyons says: “The glory of God is the living man, and the life of man is the vision of God”. Nicholas of Cusa, in his treatise on the vision of God went on to develop this insight: “Since the eye is where love is found, I know that you love me… Your gaze, O Lord, is love…. By gazing upon me, you, the hidden God, enable me to catch a glimpse of you… Your gaze bestows life… Your gaze is creative”. God’s gaze – the gaze of Jesus fills us with God’s love. Some ways of looking at others can be meaningless or even contemptuous. There are looks that reveal esteem and express love. Volunteer workers have regard for others; they remind us of the dignity of every human being and they awaken enthusiasm and hope. Volunteer workers are guardians and advocates of human rights and human dignity."
Departure Ceremony
Vatican Radio has an English translation of the Pope's farewell address at the Vienna airport, as he prepared to leave Austria. He said he felt that he had come to know the country and its people even better than before. Here is an excerpt:
"Once again I was able to experience Mariazell as a particularly grace-filled place, a place which in these days welcomed all of us and gave us inner strength for the road ahead. The throngs of people who joined in our celebration in the Basilica, in Mariazell itself and throughout Austria should inspire us, with Mary, to look to Christ and, as persons whom God looks upon with love, to face with courage the future of this country, of the continent and of the whole world."
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