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Castelgandolfo, Jul 23, 2008 / 08:15 pm (CNA).- Having returned from his visit to Australia for World Youth Day, Pope Benedict XVI has moved to his summer residence at Castel Gandolfo. After three days of rest, he will meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki on Friday and travel to the northern Italian town of Bressanone the following day.In Bressanone, a German-speaking town near the Italian border with Germany, the Pope will stay with his brother Father Georg Ratzinger in a medieval seminary from July 28 to August 11. According to ANSA news agency, a grand piano has been...

ROME, MAY 23, 2008 (Zenit.org).- If you want to understand Joseph Ratzinger, the man and the Pope, the starting point is the love of God, affirmed a cardinal who has worked closely with him. Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes, gave an inside look at the personality of Benedict XVI when he participated Tuesday in the book launch of "Benedictus," by Giuseppe de Carli. "The key to the person and the ministry of Benedict XVI is the love of God," the cardinal said, affirming that the Pontiff's first encyclical, "Deus Caritas Est," "represents the particularity...

NEWS: August 19, 2003 Bird’s Eye View of the News Atila Sinke Guimarães RATZINGER, A TOOTHLESS LION - For the last 20 years Sr. Jeannine Gramick, SSND, and Fr. Robert Nugent, SDS, have been two leading American religious stars in the Catholic “ministry” with gays and lesbians. Their innovative progressivist positions on the topic have generated a lot of publicity, so I don’t need to remind my reader who they are. On July 13, 1999 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued to both Sr. Gramick and Fr. Nugent a formal condemnation along with a permanent prohibition to...

[This article by Jim Akin is a good companion to the previous post about Arch-Tame Wuerl. Jim is director of apologetics and evangelization at "Catholic Answers" and is a contributing editor of This Rock. --PP] Abortion Is the Black Hole of Moral Issues A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favor of abortion and/or euthanasia but votes...

Vatican City, Apr 25, 2008 / 10:08 am (CNA).- This week the Italians took their turn at showing their affection and respect for the Pope by hosting a classical music concert in honor of his third anniversary and birthday. Benedict XVI thanked the choir and the orchestra for sharing the gift of music with people. Music, he said, has a spiritual value because it can “infuse hope into the human soul.” The concert was offered by the President of Italy, Giorgio Napolitano, who met with the Pope for 15 minutes beforehand. The meeting was characterized by the Vatican as...

<p>Comedian Bill Maher stopped short of apologizing Friday night for accusing Pope Benedict XVI of being a Nazi, but he said he'd refrain in the future from drawing that connection.</p> <p>"I will never make 'the pope is a Nazi' joke again," Maher said on his HBO show, "Real Time With Bill Maher."</p>

...but I cannot help it. Help what? you kindly ask. I cannot help playing the "MSM Papal Word Assocation Game." It's simple: just highlight the words and phrases that have been used over 264,000 times by other journalists to describe the Pope, creating a "story" that is simply a regurgitation of some 74,527 other stories. Today's carefully selected example comes from USA Today: When Shepherd One lands outside Washington, D.C., on April 15, the jet carrying Pope Benedict XVI to a six-day visit in the USA will deliver a complex and surprising man. His image is cast in a stern...

Remember Chris Kelly, the mudslinger at the Huffington Post who mocked Ann Coulter's father as a Nazi right after he died? On Monday, Kelly took up mocking Pope Benedict as a Nazi in attacking Bill O'Reilly, and by extension, every Catholic who attended an Easter Mass, as a way to deflect criticism of Barack Obama's poor taste in ministers: The Huffington Post has learned that Bill O'Reilly -- who claims to love America -- spent Sunday at a "church" run by a former Hitler Youth named Joseph Alois Ratzinger. Ratzinger has gone to elaborate ends to hide this connection, including...

From the comment box on my recent post on Ratzinger and Luther, these thoughts from Mark Brumley: Whatever Luther's original intent, he wound up a "heretic". His positions have often been misunderstood by Catholics. A better understanding of Luther can help reduce or eliminate unnecessary problems in the Catholc-Protestant dialogue. Indeed, because some Catholics have gone so far off the deep end, Luther can actually help them move closer to Catholicism, if they bother to understand the real Luther. However, no amount of better understanding will make Luther a Catholic. The Reformation was not, as Jaroslav Pelikan once said (in...

Trying to Skirt the Pope's (Cardinal Ratzinger's) Negative Appraisal of Harry Potter By John-Henry Westen TORONTO, August 23, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Since LifeSiteNews.com first published online scanned copies of the letters of Cardinal Ratzinger concerning Harry Potter, many have attempted to deny the Cardinal- now Pope's - statements on the matter. The latest such claim to hit the news was from a report in the Catholic News Service, the official news agency of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.  An article headlined "Catholic perspective can be seen in Potter series, says priest-devotee," by Peggy Weber published on June 27...

From the Italian magazine Panorama (click on the image for a bigger version)The article accompanying this paints a somewhat dire picture of infighting at the Vatican and resistance to the Pope. I'm brushing up on my Italian for my stay in Rome, so you'll have to forgive the rust. It speaks of a "silent battle" within the Curia, with the Pope having to deal with various groups that had formed in the last years of John Paul II.'s pontificate. He writes, "the German Pope would like a Church focused on spreading the Gospel message, with less weight to carry...

After Verona: How to “Restore Full Citizenship to the Christian Faith”Pope Ratzinger and his vicar, Ruini, see in Italy “a rather favorable terrain” for the public rebirth of Christianity in Europe and the world, too. But many do not accept their view. And the archbishop of Milan, Tettamanzi, has placed himself at the head of the opposition by Sandro MagisterROMA, October 26, 2006 – After the five-day conference in Verona, the uniqueness of the Italian Church will be the highly envied object of study in the episcopal sees of Europe and America, especially where Christianity is most in decline. From...

LONDON - Roman Catholic bishops in England and Wales rejected as “false and entirely misleading” a BBC documentary about what it said was a cover-up of child sexual abuse under a system enforced by Pope Benedict XVI in his previous job.Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, head of the Catholic Church in the two countries, plans to write to Mark Thompson, director general of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) this week to protest about the program, aired late on Sunday.The documentary, by “Panorama”, the BBC’s flagship current affairs show, examined what it described as a secret document written in 1962 that sets out...

"Lessons of the Past Must Help Us to Seek Paths of Reconciliation" CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy, SEPT. 25, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the address Benedict XVI delivered today in the papal summer residence of Castel Gandolfo, to leaders of Muslim communities in Italy and ambassadors of Muslim countries accredited to the Holy See. * * * Dear Cardinal Poupard, Your Excellencies, Dear Muslim Friends, I am pleased to welcome you to this gathering that I wanted to arrange in order to strengthen the bonds of friendship and solidarity between the Holy See and Muslim communities throughout the...

Depressing Times Oriana Fallaci, RIP, the Pope, and a Sad Age Rarely has the death of a public intellectual affected me as much as the passing of Oriana Fallaci. I never met her, and only received a brief note once from her accompanying a copy of The Rage and the Pride. The story of her career is well known, but her death, at this pivotal time, was full of paradoxes and yet instruction as well. Radical Islam is, among other things, a patriarchal movement, embedded particularly in the cult of the Middle-Eastern male, who occupies a privileged position in a...

He may seem stiff and shy at times, but Pope Benedict XVI has delighted fellow Bavarians by wading into crowds and kissing babies, shedding the image of a dour theologian from his quarter-century at the Vatican.He is not only growing into his job after 17 months in the papacy, but appears to enjoy it.In the most personal day of his homecoming visit, he knelt in prayer Wednesday at the graves of his parents and sister while his older brother — his only close living relative — leaned on a cane beside him.During the stop at the Ziegetsdorf cemetery just outside...

London, Sep. 11, 2006 (CNA) - Pope Benedict XVI and his brother, Fr. Georg Ratzinger, 82, were surprised to learn this week that their parents, Joseph and Maria, met through a singles ad their father had placed in local Catholic weekly, Liebfraubote. The disclosure came at the outset of the Pope’s return to his native Bavaria, where he intends to visit his parents’ grave and the village of Marktl am Inn, where he was born, reported the London Times. The July 1920 ad was found in the Bavarian state archives by a researcher for the tabloid Bild. According to the...

ROME, Sept. 1 — They meet every year, the eminent German professor and his old doctoral students, for a weekend of high-minded talk on a chosen topic. For years it was nothing more than that. But now the professor, once called Joseph Ratzinger, has become Pope Benedict XVI. And this year, for three days beginning Friday, the topic on the table is evolution, an issue perched on the ever more contentious front between science and belief. And so the questions rise as the meeting unfolds at a papal palace just outside Rome. Is this merely another yearly seminar? Or is...

Great post at Jimmy Akin's place about B16 in a suit. Tip to Akin for the photo, taken from some Trad site, which found it in some magazine... you get the idea. More than anything, though, the shot underlines the strong bond the Pope enjoys with his one living relative, his older brother Msgr Georg Ratzinger. The two were ordained priests together in 1951, share a deep affinity for music (the Papstbruder served for many years as director of the famed choir of Regensburg Cathedral), and on next month's Bavarian homecoming, little brother Joseph has blocked out a private...

Pope Benedict XVI Receives Custom Volvo XC90No German car for Pope Benedict XVI as the Catholic church leader received a new Volvo XC90 that has been custom tailored for his personal use. During a June 28 ceremony at the Vatican, the Pope was presented with the keys to the SUV. The V8 version vehicle is dark blue with a light interior and Volvo officials say the car, like every Volvo XC90, is designed for safety with features like ROPS (rollover protection system). Press Release Volvo Cars presented His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI, with one of its Sport Utility Vehicles. The...

ROMA, June 1, 2006 – In a St. Peter’s Square that is always extremely crowded with pilgrims from all nations, each Wednesday Benedict XVI continues the cycle of catechesis he began last March 18, on “the relationship between Christ and the Church as considered beginning with the experience of the apostles.� The continuity is interrupted only rarely: for example, on Wednesday, May 31, the pope dedicated the audience to a reflection summarizing his trip to Poland a few days earlier. The theme assigned to the cycle is revealing of pope Joseph Ratzinger’s intention to clarify the essence and foundations...

WARSAW, Poland (CNS) -- When Pope Benedict XVI arrives at the Marian shrine of Jasna Gora May 26, he will be stepping in the footsteps of his Polish predecessor and generations of Catholic pilgrims. Visitors to Jasna Gora ("Bright Mountain") are reminded of Pope John Paul II's words when he first returned to communist-ruled Poland in 1979: "So many times we came here to this holy place ... to listen to the beating of the heart of the church and of that of the motherland in the heart of the mother." Twenty-seven years later, much has changed in the surrounding...

A German pope's duty at Auschwitz Timothy W. Ryback FRIDAY, MAY 12, 2006 SALZBURG The Vatican recently announced that Pope Benedict XVI will visit Auschwitz on his scheduled trip to Poland later this month. This will be his second Auschwitz visit. In 1979, when Joseph Ratzinger was archbishop of Munich, he accompanied Pope John Paul II to the former Nazi death camp, where they celebrated Holy Communion. "It was a moving idea and a moving moment to look across these horrific fields of death in which four million human beings lost their lives, and to experience the resurrection as the...

Dear Friend of Catholic Answers: A few weeks ago I was with my grand-niece, Haruna. She is a delightsome four. At one moment, all shyness, she hides her face in her mother's skirt. A moment later she proudly shows off her English to me. "Good morning, Karl Oji-chama [honorable uncle]," she says. "Ohayo gozaimasu [good morning]," I reply with an equally wide smile. We laugh, and then she hides herself again. Like all happy children her age, Haruna does not just walk. She skips, jumps, and even dances her way along the sidewalk or through the hotel lobby. An attempted...

Marking one year since the April 19 election of Pope Benedict XVI can make the two dominant figures from last spring — John Paul II and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — already seem like ancient history. But it is a testament to both the Catholic church’s durability and continuity and the speed of the modern news cycle that the only man in white on our minds now is Pope Benedict, while images of the same Ratzinger in cardinal red appear almost odd and outdated. For Catholicism, this is a necessary thing. The church counts on the very earthly process of an...

A year into his papacy and the radical shift many had expected when Pope Benedict XVI became pope last spring has yet to arrive. Instead, he has chosen discretion. The newest entrance to the Vatican is 3.7 meters (12 feet) wide and 5 meters (16.4 feet) tall. It's a four-paneled bronze gate that looks like a row of book spines, and it's the German pope's first construction project. It looks almost as though one must go through the Word to get to the Church -- or at least into its underground parking garage. The papal palace is empty on this...

When Mozart Stunned Rome; God at the Pub Wolfgang's Memory Caught a Pope's Attention ROME, JAN. 26, 2006 (Zenit.org).- As any good music aficionado knows, 2006 marks the 350th anniversary of the birth of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Opera houses worldwide are featuring "Don Giovanni" and "Figaro," while Mozart biographies and boxed sets of concertos and sonatas proliferate in music stores. Even Rome was enchanted by this great composer and, indeed, the child prodigy from Salzburg was warmly received in the Eternal City during his brief sojourn here in 1770. Mozart is often associated with the Freemasons -- he joined the...

1. At this moment in the Church's life, the question of the primacy of Peter and of his Successors has exceptional importance as well as ecumenical significance. John Paul II has frequently spoken of this, particularly in the Encyclical Ut unum sint, in which he extended an invitation especially to pastors and theologians to "find a way of exercising the primacy which, while in no way renouncing what is essential to its mission, is nonetheless open to a new situation".1 In answer to the Holy Father's invitation, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith decided to study the matter...

The Prefecture of the Papal Household -- still headed, for now, by Milwaukee-born Archbishop James Harvey -- this morning released the annual tally of attendance figures for papal events in 2005. Due to the interregnum, to be precise, the figures accounted solely for events (general audiences, liturgical celebrations and the Angelus) presided over by Benedict XVI as Pope. John Paul II held his last on-the-ground public function on 31 January, the day before he was admitted to the Policlinico Gemelli, when he presided at a general audience in the Paul VI Hall. Any way you slice them, the '05 numbers...

Pope Benedict XVI dons a red velvet Christmas hat with white ermine trim for his weekly general audience(AFP/Vincenzo Pinto)

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Vatican newspaper said on Tuesday that homosexuality risked "destabilizing people and society", had no social or moral value and could never match the importance of the relationship between a man and a woman.The remarks were contained in a long commentary published to accompany the official release of a long-awaited document that restricted the access of homosexual men to the Roman Catholic priesthood.The article by Monsignor Tony Anatrella, a French Jesuit and psychologist, said homosexuality could not be considered an acceptable moral alternative to heterosexuality."During these past years, homosexuality has become a phenomenon that is always...

"intelligent design," the notion that living things are too complex to have been produced by evolution, has gotten a cold shoulder in the scientific community. Not so in the popular imagination, where its advocates have convinced much of the public and even an Austrian cardinal that it deserves a place alongside Darwin in science classrooms. The public-relations successes of what's being widely called "ID" reflect the skillful way in which its proponents have framed the debate to place God and Darwin in direct opposition. As Phillip Johnson, the movement's most respected leader, has candidly described it, the principal strategy followed...

The first openly gay Episcopal bishop insisted Wednesday he was not encouraging Roman Catholics to leave their church when he criticized its view of homosexuals during a recent speech in London. New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, at a service Friday commemorating the 10th anniversary of Changing Attitude, a British group which advocates full inclusion of gays in the Anglican faith community, noted during his talk that many Catholics in his home state were becoming Episcopalian. "Pope Ratzinger may be the best thing that ever happened to the Episcopal Church," Robinson said, referring to former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who is...

Pope Benedict's first encyclical due in Dec-sourceVATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict has written his first encyclical, the highest form of papal writing addressed to all members of the Roman Catholic Church, a Vatican source said on Monday. The source said the encyclical, which is expected to be published before the end of the year, deals with one's personal relationship with God. The work is just under 50 pages long and will probably be published to coincide with the feast of the Immaculate Conception on Dec. 8, the source said. The source said the encyclical, written in the Pope's native...

EWTN will be re-airing Arroyo's interview with then Cardinal Ratzinger, tonight at 8pm EST. For those who are unable to watch, here is the transcript. * * * * * THE WORLD OVER: CARDINAL RATZINGER INTERVIEW Raymond Arroyo with Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger The following is a transcript of the interview by EWTN News Director Raymond Arroyo of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, which first aired on EWTN on 5 September 2003. Cardinal Ratzinger is the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, an office to which he was appointed by Pope John Paul II in 1981. Introduction Raymond: ...

Listen to a liberal Catholic in Rome these days, and the words "like Nixon going to China" will probably slip out at some point in the conversation. It is the whisper of hope among long shut-out Church reformers that Pope Benedict XVI's unquestioned conservative credentials could make him just the right man to loosen rigid doctrinal policy after the quarter century of John Paul II's traditionalist ways. The German Pope's surprisingly warm persona and his decision to create a more open debate in this month's synod of bishops have fuelled the sense among some that change is in the air....

The Revolution of God, the first book produced by Pope Benedict XVI since his election to the papacy, was released by the Vatican on October 11. The 130-page book contains all of the speeches that the Holy Father delivered during World Youth Day celebrations in Cologne, Germany, from August 18 to 21. It also includes the text of his remarks at a general audience on August 24, after his return, commenting on the trip. The Italian-language edition was produced jointly by the Vatican publishing house, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, and St. Paul Editions. Separate editions, in appropriate translations, will be available...

BERLIN -The former East German secret service considered Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, one of the most dangerous critics of communism and spied on him starting in 1974, a leading weekly reported Sunday.The Bild am Sonntag released excerpts of vast files showing that the secret police, or Stasi, closely watched Ratzinger for years, collecting biographical details, information from spies and expectations of his next moves.Ratzinger's friendship with Polish-born Pope John Paul II - who Poles today largely credit with giving them the courage to challenge communism -was viewed by the Stasi as particularly dangerous."Since the mid-70s, Ratzinger has...

Secret police spied on pope 02/10/2005 13:59 - (SA) Berlin - The East German secret police spied on the man who would become Pope Benedict XVI for 15 years, targeting him as one of the Vatican's fiercest opponents of communism, according to a report published on Sunday. From April 1974 until the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, the feared Ministry for State Security kept close tabs on the then theology professor Joseph Ratzinger, according to documents from the so-called Stasi archives printed in the weekly Bild am Sonntag. "Ratzinger is seen at the Vatican as one of...

Benedict's Blanket Replaces Bernadine's Seamless Garment In the June 2004 essay, Seamless Garment or Political Comforter? , Michael Ulmann accurately described the seamless garment as follows: In the 1970s, the late Joseph Cardinal Bernardin and his episcopal allies advanced the notion that Catholic politicians should not be judged only, or even primarily, by their position on abortion. Abortion was merely one strand in a rich and finely woven “seamless garment” of Catholic social teaching in defense of life. Numerous other issues, the bishops said, ought to be considered. Nearly one month after this essay was published, the now Pope...

Cardinal Pell on the Dictatorship of Relativism "A Recipe for Disenfranchisement and Passivity" CANBERRA, Australia, SEPT. 23, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Here is the text of an address Cardinal George Pell of Sydney delivered Wednesday at the National Press Club in the Australian capital. * * * The Dictatorship of Relativism Address to the National Press Club By Cardinal George Pell Shortly before he entered the conclave in which he was elected Pope, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger preached the homily at the pre-conclave Mass and warned against the rise of "a dictatorship of relativism." It is an evocative phrase which frightened some and...

A new move to bar celibate gays from the priesthood would signal Pope Benedict's priorities, says TIME Vatican correspondent Jeff Israely Among the most severe words issued from the Vatican in recent memory were written by then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, just a month before he became Pope Benedict XVI. Tucked into the Good Friday meditations for the Way of the Cross ceremony at the Coliseum was a phrase whose bluntness caught many in Rome that evening off guard: "How much filth there is in the Church," he wrote, "and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely...

EMINENT cleric, Francis Cardinal Arinze, has said that he harbours no personal grudge against Pope Benedict XVI stressing that the Holy Spirit who guided his election does not discriminate against any contestant to the papacy on ground of race or region. Arinze, the Prefect for the Congregation of Divine Worship and the Discipline of Sacrament in the Vatican, was widely touted as likely successor to the late Pope John Paul 11. But the incumbent formerly, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger emerged the new Pope at a Conclave of 115 Cardinals of the Catholic Church on April 19, 2005. However, speaking in an...

ROMA August 25, 2005 – He had announced it since his first morning as pope, in the seminal address delivered in the Sistine Chapel on April 20: “The Eucharist will be the centre of the World Youth Day in Cologne in August.” And what he said, he did. To the million young people gathered from 197 countries for four days in the city that keeps the relics of the Magi – even to those of little faith and the non-baptized – Benedict XVI preached “the inconceivable greatness of a God who humbled himself even to appearing in a manger,...

COLOGNE, Germany -- Pope Benedict XVI chose unusually tough language Saturday to tell Muslim leaders they must work harder to combat terrorism and steer youth away from "the darkness of a new barbarism." On the third day of his first foreign trip as pope, Benedict met with 10 representatives of Germany's growing Muslim community as part of his effort to reach out to other faiths. But he quickly dispensed with the diplomatic niceties and zeroed in on the "cruel fanaticism" of terrorism and the responsibility of religious leaders and educators to prevent it. ADVERTISEMENT "You guide Muslim believers and train...

From Cologne to the Conquest of Europe: How the Muslim Brotherhood is Challenging the PopeAt World Youth Day in Cologne, Benedict XVI is also meeting with Muslims. Here are the leaders and organizations of radical Islam in Germany, with their plans for expansion by Sandro Magister ROMA, August 18, 2005 – The penultimate event of Benedict XVI's visit to Cologne, before the vigil and Mass with the young people of World Youth Day XX, will be a Saturday, August 20 meeting with the "representatives of some of the Muslim communities." The meeting will take place at the residence of the...

ROME, Italy, July 28, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In the conclusion of Cardinal Ratzinger’s lecture, now Pope Benedict XVI, delivered on April 1st, the eve of John Paul II’s death, the then Cardinal strongly denounced the European Enlightenment culture and its increasing dogmatism against religion, Christianity and freedom.  The Cardinal expressed his belief that the reasons given by the architects of the EU Constitution for excluding God from the document—that the mention of God or recognition of the Christian roots of the continent might offend those of other religions—doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. “The affirmation that the mention of the Christian...

"It is a Grave Responsibility to Use Alternative Vaccines" VATICAN CITY, JULY 26, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Here is a letter sent by Bishop Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, to Mrs. Debra Vinnedge, executive director, Children of God for Life. The letter presents the following study conducted by the academy entitled "Moral Reflections on Vaccines Prepared from Cells Derived from Aborted Human Fetuses." * * * Vatican City, June 9, 2005 Mrs. Debra Vinnedge Executive Director, Children of God for Life United States Dear Mrs. Debra Vinnedge, On June 4, 2003, you wrote to His Eminence Cardinal Joseph...

A LifeSiteNews article from last week, headlined “Pope Opposes Harry Potter Novels”, made it appear that Benedict XVI has read the Potter books and found them dangerous. Given the release a few days later of the sixth novel in J. K. Rowling’s famous series, the timing of the story can only be considered brilliant by those who oppose the Harry Potter phenomenon. This news is already swirling around the Internet.When contacted by LifeSiteNews, Potter opponent and Catholic novelist Michael O’Brien was quick to state that this judgment “reveals the Holy Father’s depth and wide ranging gifts of spiritual discernment” and...