__NEWS__Germany_________________________
A Blunt Message to the German Hierarchy
When Pope John Paul provided an unusually forceful analysis of the weaknesses of
German Catholicism, the nation’s hierarchy responded with a pregnant silence.
By Stephan Kampowski
On February 21, Pope John Paul II created 44 new cardinals, a record in Church history. Among the many remarkable facts about the consistory was the fact that four German bishops received red hats. This brought the total number of German cardinals to nine. Only Italy and the United States can boast a greater number. Understandably, there was great rejoicing in Germany at the time of the consistory.
For several years, most German bishops had found themselves in a painful disagreement with the Vatican on whether the Church could play an active role in the German government’s shrewd design for handling the problem of abortion. Abortion is technically illegal in Germany, but it is not punishable as long as a woman who obtains an abortion can certify that she has received counseling prior to obtaining the procedure. Most German bishops argued that the Church should continue to operate counseling agencies which provided the necessary certificates. They maintained that although a certificate issued by a Church-related agency could then be used to fulfill the legal requirement for obtaining an abortion, the fact that Catholic counseling centers distributed those certificates would also motivate women with a sound incentive for visiting those agencies. There, they reasoned, the women would receive more encouragement to continue their pregnancies—encouragement they were unlikely to obtain at the competing state-run agencies. The net result, the German bishops argued, would be a reduction in the number of abortions, thanks to the work of these Catholic counseling centers.
The Vatican, however, insisted that this kind of involvement, however well-intended, threatened to compromise the Church’s unconditional stance in defense of human life. Church-sponsored agencies should not hand out certificates that could be used to obtain an abortion, Pope John Paul II said. After months of inconclusive discussions, the ensuing conflict between the Vatican and the majority of German bishops finally ended recently, with the German hierarchy accepting the Pope’s directive.
The creation of four new German cardinals, then, was widely recognized as ointment for wounds that were still hurting. That analysis was all the more persuasive since one of the new cardinals was Karl Lehmann of Mainz, head of the German episcopal conference, who had been acting as the chief advocate for Church involvement in the certifying process.
A listing of concerns
On February 22—the day after the consistory, and also the feast of the Chair of St. Peter—Pope John Paul II signed a letter addressed to all of the German cardinals, old and new, telling them about his thoughts on the state of the Catholic Church in Germany. Every cardinal was addressed individually, but each of the letters had the same content. The four new cardinals took the Pope’s letter with them on their way home from the consistory; the others received it by different means.
In the opening paragraph the Pope expresses his appreciation for the German Church: “I acknowledge that the Church in Germany is dynamic with regards to her activity and that in a truly praiseworthy manner she cares for her brothers and sisters in need.” He also praises the Church’s “solid organizational structures” and her presence in public life.
After these encouraging words, John Paul II attends to the problems confronting the Christian faithful in Germany: While some difficulties are essentially similar to those in other European countries, there are also a number of problems that are specific the country, he suggests.
“We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that more and more people are abandoning the active practice of the faith, or accepting only a portion of the Gospel and the teaching of the Church,” the Pontiff writes. The process of secularization, he continues, threatens the interior life of the Church, so that Catholicism “may appear strong on the outside, but has no inner vitality, and has lost credibility in the process.”
To counter this development, the Pope asks the cardinals to focus their efforts on proclaiming the Catholic faith in its fullness, with a special view to four major areas of the Church’s life:
1) issues regarding institutions of Catholic theological education and seminaries,
2) questions of marriage and the family,
3) the work of ecumenism, and
4) the subject of the cooperation between priests and the laity in the pastoral ministry.
For each theme John Paul II makes reference to certain ecclesial documents that he recommends for further study and fuller implementation in the overall life of the German Church.
Regarding the first topic, the Pope urges that those “who exercise the ministry of teaching and governance in the name of the Church must be firmly rooted in the Church’s faith, so as not to fall prey to the spirit of the age or to resignation.” He reminds the cardinals that “the doctrine taught at theological faculties is not a question of arbitrary judgment but . . . must derive from the faith and lead to the faith.” For a sure foundation in these matters he recommends both the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the catechism issued by the German episcopal conference.
In the area of marriage and the family, the Holy Father expresses his concern about the attitudes taken by German society as a whole. “Marriage as a covenant of life and love between a man and a woman, ordered towards the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of children, is called into question by many people and also by the legislature,” he observes. He emphasizes that at a time when cultures are losing sight of their Christian principles, it is all the more important that the cardinals, along with all the bishops, offer clear guidance to the faithful. This guidance must be aimed at helping Christian believers to live according to God’s plan for marriage and the family and assisting them “to adhere faithfully to the moral principles expounded by the Encyclical Humane Vitae, the post-synodal Exhortation Familiaris Consortio, and the Letter Concerning the Reception of Holy Communion by Divorced and Remarried Members of the Faithful by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.”
Next, the Pope makes it clear that the way Vatican II opened for ecumenism is irreversible. At the same time, he warns against certain abuses and confusions, such as intercommunion. Such abuses, he says, far from advancing Christian unity, are in fact detrimental to the cause. To avoid confusion, it is important to give a more accurate orientation to ecumenical efforts. In fact, the Pope tells the German hierarchy, the main danger for ecumenism is a neglect for the cause of truth: “An ecumenism that more or less brackets the question of truth can lead only to a success that is merely a matter of appearances,” he writes. The Roman Pontiff insists that the declaration Dominus Iesus—which underlines the unique and central role of the Catholic Church in the plan of salvation—must serve as a firm foundation for any ecumenical dialogue.
Finally, John Paul II addresses the question of cooperation between lay persons and priests in the pastoral ministry. He stresses the crucial importance of the issue, saying that nothing less than the very identity of priests and lay people is at stake here. He notices that despite clear and repeated directives from Rome, there are frequent reports of lay people delivering homilies, presiding at Eucharistic liturgies, and directing the activities of a parish in ways that are clearly at odds with the Church’s doctrine or discipline. Even if such practices may seem opportune for the moment, they will hurt the local Church in the long run because “they are contrary to the inner nature of the Church,” he writes. Therefore, the Pope urges the cardinals to assist those involved in pastoral ministry to come to a better understanding and a more faithful practice of the Instruction on Certain Questions Regarding the Collaboration of the Non-ordained Faithful in the Sacred Ministry of Priests, which was promulgated as a joint effort by eight Roman dicasteries.
At the closing of his letter, the Holy Father assures the cardinals of his prayers, both for their personal concerns and for the concerns of the Church in Germany as a whole.
No public response
At the beginning of March—just a matter of days after the February consistory—the German episcopal conference held its regular annual meeting. Cardinal Lehmann distributed copies of the Pope’s letter to all bishops present at the assembly. Somehow a copy also found its way to the press, and the letter was published in the middle of March. And yet, even though all the bishops held the letter in their hands during the plenary assembly, they did not discuss it during the sessions. The episcopal conference did not issue any official comment on the letter, nor will one find a copy of the Pope’s message on the web site of the German bishops’ conference.
What could be the reason for this absence of public discussion? Did the Pope’s letter embarrass the German bishops? Perhaps they were manifesting the wish to forget about the letter as soon as possible. Who likes to be reminded of an unpleasant rebuke? It is certainly true that the Pope’s critique was on target; every one of the Roman documents recommended in the Pope’s letter—from Humanae Vitae to Dominus Iesus—has caused some significant upheaval in Germany, both in secular society and within the Church. Judging from both the content of his letter and his creation of new German cardinals at the February consistory, it seems equally clear that the future of the Church in Germany is a matter of real concern to the Pope.
While the episcopal conference closed itself off in complete silence about the topic, two cardinals were willing to offer some comments on the Pope’s message in interviews with the press. Talking to Der Spiegel, the German equivalent of Newsweek, the newly created Cardinal Walter Kasper, President of the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity, remarked that German readers should not be upset about the letter. Instead, he said, they should read the Pope’s message carefully. If they did, he continued, they would recognize that the Pope does not consider the weakening of the Catholic faith to be an exclusively German phenomenon. Secularization is a problem for the entire Western world, Cardinal Kasper said. Thus he concluded that the main point of the Pope’s letter is a demonstration of how closely the Pontiff holds Germany to his heart.
In an interview with Welt am Sonntag, Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne called the letter “the Pope’s legacy for the Church in Germany.” He too interpreted the message as a sign that the Pope really cares about the country, in part because of Germany’s powerful influence on other nations. The cardinal rejected the notion that the German bishops declined to discuss the letter because they found it unimportant, or perhaps embarrassing. Quite the contrary, he argued, the bishops had not taken up the Pope’s message at their plenary meeting because they regarded it as especially significant. He explained that the assembly already had a full agenda, the bishops had a pressing issue to discuss (they issued a statement on genetic engineering and biotechnology), and they felt that the Pope’s letter was too important to be discussed as a side issue. Cardinal Meisner expressed his confidence that the message would be the subject of extended discussion at one of the next meetings of German bishops.
The German media certainly did not see the letter in as positive a light as the two cardinals suggested. One of the most important national newspapers called the Pope’s letter a
blauen Brief—a letter of warning, of the sort that a child receives from his teacher, to give to his parents, because he was naughty at school. But perhaps the papal missive received its harshest treatment not because of what the German newspapers said about it, but by the fact that they did not say much about it at all. For a few days there were scattered, brief news reports; then there was silence. Neglect and indifference can be more damaging than a sharp pen.
Stephan Kampowski, a German student and free-lance writer, is currently stationed in Rome.