Plucking gems of wisdom from the words of Pope Benedict

Well….actually all of Pope Benedict XVI’s messages bear great wisdom. Period.

But there’s this report of one today that I found uncannily keen in speaking wisdom to the daily reality of the modern world.

In this routine meeting with priests from a diocese in Italy, the Pope said that modern challenges may come and go, but the faith endures.

The Holy Father said that Adolph Hitler saw himself as the man who would bring about the final collapse of Catholicism, “because only a Catholic could destroy Catholicism.” But the Church survived both Hitler and the persecution under Marxist regimes of the 20th century, the Pope observed. These totalitarian regimes were powerful, he concluded, “but the words of Christ are stronger.”

This wasn’t a big audience, and the Pope had no prepared remarks. Benedict does best, or at least very well, speaking impromptu with his listeners.

Pope Benedict spoke to about 120 priests of Albano at his summer residence on Castel Gandolfo. Drawing questions from the clerics and responding extemporaneously, he also spoke about the daily life of priests, pastoral work, the liturgy, family life, and young people.

Speaking of the liturgy, and its dialogue between God and his people, this particular line from Benedict’s message struck me with particular precision:

The texts of the liturgy, he stressed, are “not theatrical scripts,” but rather prayers, which the priest offers as leader of the assembly.

It reminded me of hearing Cardinal Francis Arinze tell a small gathering in Chicago that “even those who do Shakespeare use the words he wrote.”

How do the two go together? Maybe it’s a glimpse into how my mind works. But it made me think about Arinze’s message, and certainly Benedict’s, that authentic liturgy — Liturgiam authenticam — is not a dramatic presentation open to artist interpretation. It is a dialogue of revealed prayer that, while being re-presented by different presiders, is always uttered in spirit and in truth. There’s a sublime beauty and reverence to that.