(22/6/16) “Teaching and Learning the Love of God” is the title of the first volume of the collection written by Joseph Ratzinger – Benedict XVI. It collects Ratzinger’s homilies on priesthood and he will receive it as a present on 28th June in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace, during the solemn celebration of the 65thanniversary of his ordination. Pope Francis will attend the celebration.
“Every time I read the works of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI - the Pope wrote in the preface of the book – it is increasingly clear that he has done and he is doing 'theology on its knees': it is a ‘kneeling theology,’ because before being a great theologian and teacher of the faith, it is clear that he is a man who truly believes, who truly prays; he is a man who personifies the holiness, a man of peace, a man of God.”
It is a passage of the text – partially published in preview by Corriere della Sera, almost totally published by Repubblica and totally published by L’Osservatore Romano – that followed the wide international press review (from Croatia to Vietnam, from United States to Brazil, from Italy to France, from Germany to Poland) when the news of the celebration of 28th June was given by the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Vatican Foundation.
Benedict XVI, Pope Francis wrote, “embodies the actions of the priests in an exemplary way: that deep rooting in God, without which all the abilities and all the supposed intellectual superiority, all the money and power are useless; he embodies that constant relationship with the Lord Jesus without which nothing is really true, everything becomes routine, clergymen end up becoming like salaried employees, bishops’ bureaucrats and the Church is not the Church of Christ, but a product, a superfluous NGO".