Pope Benedict, social projects, evangelisation

Many former critics of Pope Benedict XVI have now become conscious that the Holy Father is not only a personality with a great vision and acumen, but also a great spiritual leader who openly and very prudently says what he means and means what he says.

One easily recalls his homily in his Mass to his fellow Cardinals on April 18, 2005, before the beginning of the conclave in the Sistine Chapel to elect Pope John Paul II's successor. In his homily Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger stressed that love requires that we tell people the truth and, at all times, to tell the truth with much love. And this is precisely what he himself, as Pope, says in all his important speeches, addresses, interviews, audiences, homilies and documents to the clergy and the faithful.

Surely, all his speeches during his Apostolic Visit to his native Bavaria (September 9-14) confirm this very clearly. Worthy of special mention is his homily in Munich Cathedral on September 10, when the Pope touched the vital topic of social projects and evangelisation.

He told those present: "I would like to share some of my experience in meeting bishops from throughout the world. The Catholic Church in Germany is outstanding for its social activities, for its readiness to help wherever help is needed. During their visits ad limina (every five years), the bishops, most recently those of Africa, have always mentioned with gratitude the generosity of the German Catholics and ask me to convey that gratitude, and that is what I wish to do now, publicly. The bishops of the Baltic countries, who came before vacations began, also told me about how German Catholics assisted them greatly in rebuilding their churches, which were badly in need of repair after decades of Communist rule."

The Holy Father, who in line with his great predecessor is a firm believer in the indispensable need of a "new evangelisation" added: "Every now and then, however, some African bishop would say to me: 'If I come to Germany and present social projects, suddenly every door opens. But if I come with a plan of evangelisation, I meet with reservations'.

"Clearly some people have the idea that social projects should be urgently undertaken, while anything dealing with God or even the Catholic faith is of limited and lesser urgency. Yet the experience of those bishops is that evangelisation itself should be foremost, that the God of Jesus Christ must be known, believed and loved, and that hearts must be converted if progress is to be made on social issues and reconciliation is to begin, and if for example - AIDS is to be combated by realistically facing its deeper causes and the sick are given the loving care they need.

"Social issues and the Gospel are inseparable. When we bring people only knowledge, ability, technical competence and tools, we bring them too little. All too quickly the mechanisms of violence take over: the capacity to destroy and to kill becomes dominant, it becomes the way to gain power, a power which at some point should bring law, but which will never be able to do so. Reconciliation and a shared commitment to justice and love, recedes into the distance.

"The criteria by which technology is placed at the service of law and love are then no longer clear: yet it is precisely on these criteria that everything depends: criteria which are not only theories, but which enlighten the heart and thus set reason and action on the right path."

Towards the end of his homily the Pope emphasised that people in Africa and Asia admire the scientific and technical prowess of the West, but they are frightened by a form of rationality which totally excludes God from man's vision, "as if this were the highest form of reason, and one to be taught to their cultures too."