MADRID — Archbishop Gerhard Ludwig Müller, prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, urged Catholics in Spain to embrace Church teaching as the foundation for a better society.
“We cannot lose the courage to proclaim the Gospel today,” said Archbishop Müller in an interview with COPE Radio on Jan. 28.
He explained that the Catholic Church has a “much better” understanding of human needs than the secular ideologies that are embraced by many politicians.
The archbishop underscored that the “secularist” mentality cannot provide an adequate response to man’s sufferings, to his existential problems or to what lies beyond death.
Nor can such a mentality sufficiently explain how to build a society based on the values of “social justice and human dignity,” he said.
Rather than focusing on “useless” controversies about the Church and other “superficial” complaints, attention should be placed “on the great existential questions of the men and women living in the world today,” Archbishop Müller explained.
The world needs “a message of hope,” and the Church gives hope to all mankind, he continued, adding that the Catholic faith is not irrational, because “a connection exists between reason and faith.”
“In order to present the Gospel as a force that gives life, we need to emphasize the intellectual and rational nature of the faith,” he stressed.
However, he said, we must also direct man’s reason towards faith, towards “the encounter with God.”
Universities are critical in this intellectual framework and have been the “foundations of the Church” in European history, the prefect said, emphasizing that this same “essence” applies to universities run by both the state and the Church.
Archbishop Müller called Pope Benedict XVI a “high intellectual” who is at the same time “a very humble, very simple, very educated person.” The Holy Father is also “in great health,” he said.
“The Pope is capable of leading the Church down the right path towards a new culture of humanity,” he explained, “because humanization and evangelization are like two hands of the same body.”
John Zmirak: We Are All Islamists Now
Benjamin Wiker: The Church and the (Secular) State
Comments
Post a Comment
SECULARISM: the principle of separation between government institutions and the persons mandated to represent the State from religious institutions and religious dignitaries(see Wikipedia). Being SECULAR does not necessarily imply hostility to God or religion, though some use the term this way Martin Luther used to speak of “secular work” as a vocation from God for most Christians
When Pope Benedict XVI speaks of SECULARISM he means anyone who does not belong to the one and only TRUE Church and are therefore not Roman Catholic. Some opponents of church-state separation redefine “secularism” as “state neutrality” to allow their group (among others) to get state funding. Others try to discredit it by conflating “secularism” with “atheism”. But it’s a political, rather than a religious doctrine and its purpose is to help level the playing field in order to give a better chance for human rights.
Trebert’s thought that Pope Benedict sees secularism applying only to non-Catholics is not correct. Many faiths, Christian and non-Christian, are rightly concerned at the effects of current aggressive secularism. He talks about secularism seeking a level playing field. In fact they are doing the opposite. The secularist tactic in the United States and in the UK is to rubbish the views of Church leaders as being out of touch with the times we live in, and being personal beliefs, should not be imposed on others. Most of the media give this view their full backing. Courage will most certainly be required for people of faith to hold on to their values in the face of Government backed aggressive secularism.
Gerard Paul,
FAITH (as accepted by all Christian institutions) is a gift from God - it cannot be taken away from anyone, it is an inner experience- not an outward display of religiosity.
Separation of Church and State prevents the State from supporting any religion or from interfering with it also obliges religion to leave the public sphere open to all. When both sides respect the boundaries, secularism provides a framework for freedom of conscience, tolerance and democracy. Secularism does not guarantee human rights but it helps make them possible.
We have nothing to fear from secularism or government interference. Religion in free countries has never enjoyed a greater level of religious freedom. Unlike some countries Catholics, Jews, Muslims, etc., are totally free to practise their beliefs free of government interference- while the media enjoy the freedom of speech.
“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord”. – Romans 8:38-39
Terbert,
You don’t seem to understand what ‘Secularism’ is. It is an ‘ism’ just like ‘Catholicism’ or ‘Protestantism’. It is a belief system. We are not talking about the fact that in the US, the government can not establish a religion. We are talking about the expulsion of religion from having any rights in their own government.
We can see how little we have to fear from ‘Secularism’ as Europes practicing Catholics dwindle to a fraction of one percent. Secularism fills our airways, covers our computer screens, and has even infected the Church itself. What you are saying reminds me of the man trying to induce a child into getting into their car with candy. There is nothing to fear, the candy tastes good. That is the way Secularism is, it is constantly telling religious people that God is not needed and to the non-religious that religion is dangerous. Look at the media coverage of pedophile priests. If you just listed to the media, you wouldn’t know that there is a tremendously worse problem with pedophiles in Public schools, in fact some estimates have it roughly 20 to 100 times worse in Public schools. But when is the last time you heard about a public school pedophile in the news. In fact, if there has been an incident in your local school in the last five years, you know the administration is hiding it. When I lived in a small town, there was at least one incident every year, but in a small town you hear about it no matter whether it is in the news or not.
Grok,
Never make assumptions about another person. When our Pope speaks about secularism he is talking about those that are not Catholic. Secular does NOT mean the person does not believe in God.There are probably not two peope in the world who share the same belief system even though they share the same religion.
A democracy means accepting the government the majority of people voted for. Don’t fight it learn to accept and change what you can. Read St. Francis’ Prayer but do so with kindness and love.
Post a Comment
By submitting this form, you give The National Catholic Register permission to publish this comment. Comments will be published at our discretion, and may be edited for clarity and length. For best formatting, please limit your response to one paragraph and don't hit "enter" to force line breaks.
The time period for commenting on this article has expired.