Keywords: Pope Benedict Xvi
-
RELIGION
- Miles Pattenden
- 28 February 2023
4 Comments
Following the death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, some believe Pope Francis is now free to advance a progressive agenda, while there’s good reason to doubt Francis will be willing or able to forward any meaningful change beyond that already achieved.
READ MORE
-
AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 04 November 2021
13 Comments
In large organisations love hardly rates a mention. Mission statements highlight care, duty, responsibility and friendliness, but not love. Love is generally seen as an interrupter, combustible, something to fence in with protocols and professional standards, and for HR to monitor. When Pope Benedict XVI devoted an Encyclical to the place of love in public relationships, people were surprised. His argument is worth revisiting.
READ MORE 
-
AUSTRALIA
- Irfan Yusuf
- 30 August 2019
7 Comments
My views on the Middle East have somewhat mellowed since then, due to my own reading and notwithstanding the harassment I and other supporters of Palestinian rights have experienced over the years. Having the then Deputy Prime Minister on our side certainly provided us with the strength to continue speaking our truths.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
- Andrew Hamilton
- 08 February 2017
18 Comments
The inflated image I once had of Cardinal Ratzinger, and that many Catholics have of cardinals and other authority figures, was shaped by fear. Fear hands over to the human beings behind the image a power they do not possess. Conversations always turn to them and inhibit the free and constructive living of faith. In helping to demystify such images Last Testament, the autobiography (written with Peter Seewald) of Pope Benedict XVI, serves us well.
READ MORE
-
AUSTRALIA
- John Warhurst
- 01 September 2015
18 Comments
There is always an appetite for anything linking Tony Abbott and Bob Santamaria. The journalist in Abbott has encouraged observers to play up the links, even though it has never been entirely clear what he is saying. He has explained that he was impressed as a young man by Santamaria’s courage as an 'advocate for unfashionable truths’, but he also pays his public dues to a number of prominent figures including John Howard, Cardinal George Pell, John Hewson, Bronwyn Bishop and even Pope Benedict XVI.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
Both John Paul II and Benedict XVI made passing reference to environmental issues. Benedict spoke of the need for protection of the environment, resources the climate in his encyclical Caritas in Veritate. But in terms of its significance, Pope Francis’ forthcoming encyclical has the potential to do for the environmental movement what Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum (1891) did for the union movement – to provide it with a powerful source of moral and religious legitimacy in the face of those forces which have sought to limit their influence.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
- Paul Collins
- 20 January 2015
43 Comments
Pope Francis has been hailed for his ‘rattling’ and ‘upsetting’ Catholic climate change sceptics and politicians. His predecessors John Paul II and Benedict XVI were ahead of most politicians on the issue, but essentially they underestimated the magnitude and urgency of the environmental problems we face. It is likely that Francis will make a decisive effort to confront climate change during 2015.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
- Neil Ormerod
- 13 March 2014
10 Comments
No one can deny the impact Francis has had. The question remains whether the differences between him and his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI are a matter of style or substance. Francis has downplayed the prospects of major doctrinal changes, yet the rehabilitation of liberation theology and the bringing in from the cold of outspoken 'extreme centrist' theologian Cardinal Walter Kasper do reveal a fundamental shift.
READ MORE
-
AUSTRALIA
- Michael Mullins
- 18 February 2013
34 Comments
Benedict's resignation makes him look like a radical in the tradition of Christian radicalism. He wrote that after examining his conscience, he concluded that he should resign because he was no longer adequate to exercise the Petrine ministry. This logic has implications for other conventions and rules such as priestly celibacy.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
- Charles Sherlock
- 11 October 2012
15 Comments
My only contact with Catholics prior to 1963 was avoiding the local Catholic school when walking home, for fear of having stones thrown at me, in my state primary school uniform — sadly, some state schoolers did likewise to Catholic students. I remember it as a parable of pre-Vatican II Catholic-Protestant relationships in Australia.
READ MORE
-
AUSTRALIA
- Michael Mullins
- 16 July 2012
16 Comments
Church leaders are often criticised for putting the reputation of the Church before the needs of victims. Last week the Australian Defence Force faced similar criticism following the release of a damning report on sexual abuse. There are lessons for Defence in Pope Benedict XVI's 2010 admission that sexual abuse reflects 'the sin inside the Church'.
READ MORE
-
RELIGION
- Andrew Hamilton
- 19 January 2012
8 Comments
The visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Great Britain last year prompted an interesting experiment. The Church asked for lay volunteers to deal with media enquiries. At first glance this could be construed as an exercise in corporate spin with a focus on persuasion and not on truth.
READ MORE