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Italian general: US official bragged Benedict would be ‘forced’ to resign weeks after 2005 electionThe Italian general alleges that a US official of 'the highest ranks' had bragged in 2005 that Pope Benedict XVI would be forced to resign.On the eve of Pope Benedict XVI’s burial, Piero Laporta, a retired Italian brigadier general, published a stunning piece on his own blog.This Catholic author, who previously lobbied to have Benedict participate (and influence) the controversial Synod on the Family some eight years ago, is now revealing that in the first weeks after the election of Joseph Ratzinger to the papal throne...

On the eve of Pope Benedict XVI’s burial, Piero Laporta, a retired Italian brigadier general, published a stunning piece on his own blog.This Catholic author, who previously lobbied to have Benedict participate (and influence) the controversial Synod on the Family some eight years ago, is now revealing that in the first weeks after the election of Joseph Ratzinger to the papal throne in 2005, an official of the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) “was bragging about the resignation to which H.H. Benedict XVI of revered memory would soon be forced.”If this story is true, however, “soon” would have to mean...

For several years there was German supremacy: Joseph Ratzinger, alias Pope Benedict XVI, had established an influential network in Rome. Now this system is collapsing - and the former Pope can hardly hope for support. The relationship with Pope Francis seems to have broken down. The downfall of the German supremacy in the Vatican is observed every morning by many. It is quiet at St Peter's this winter, unusually quiet. The pandemic has silenced St Peter's Square. The otherwise usual background noise of pilgrims streaming to St Peter's does not disturb the peace in the Vatican at the moment.

On May 17, I published an article in the Italian newspaper La Verità about pope Benedict’s abdication. A few days before, in a renowned Italian geopolitical magazine called Limes, Professor Germano Dottori had argued that Joseph Ratzinger’s 2013 abdication, and the former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s resignation in 2011, after a financial storm sold to public opinion as a “public debt” crisis, were the result of pressures on the part of Obama administration in the United States. According to Dottori, Obama was eager to dethrone Benedict XVI for two reasons. On the one hand, his presidency was close to...

“Do you not know,” says Saint Paul to the lax and factious Corinthians, “that we shall judge angels?” They had ceded to the unbelievers around them the authority to judge a controversy between Christian brothers. But Jesus says, “Judge not, lest you be judged,” because the criterion by which we measure others will be our measure too, and we are not likely to pass that test. Does Paul contradict Jesus? Not at all.  Consider the Pharisees, who liked to pray and fast conspicuously, pulling long faces so that everyone would know they were in the grip of holiness. Jesus...

CANDLEMAS The Encounter Between Chaos and Light Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger In everyday modern life we are hardly aware that on February 2nd we celebrate an ancient feast, common to the Church of both East and West, which used to have a great significance in the rural calendar: Candlemas. Tributaries from many historical sources have flowed together into this feast, with the result that it sparkles with many colors. Its immediate reference is to the event when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem forty days after his birth to perform the prescribed sacrifice of purification. The liturgy...

View of interior of the catacombs of Saint Gennaro in Naples. (us.fotolia.com | dudlajzov) At Christmas 1969, Professor Joseph Ratzinger gave a radio talk with the provocative title, “What Will the Future Church Look Like?” (You can find it in Faith and the Future, published by Ignatius Press). One of the concluding paragraphs was destined to become perhaps the most quoted excerpt from Ratzinger’s extensive bibliography, when Professor Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI: “From the crisis of today a new Church of tomorrow will emerge – a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have...

The Most Essential Question of Every Liturgy – A Meditation on a Teaching From Joseph Ratzinger Msgr. Charles Pope • July 5, 2015 • There is a legend of how the liturgy and the Faith took hold in Rus (Russia). Prince Vladimir of Kiev was seeking a right worship for his people and sent representatives to look into various faiths and also liturgies. When emissaries went south to observe the Greek Christian Liturgy, they returned saying that they were not sure if they had been in Heaven or on Earth, so beautiful was what they had seen in the Hagia Sophia in...

Vatican, Apr. 06 (CWNews.com) - The funeral Mass for Pope John Paul II (bio - news) will be held in St. Peter's Basilica on Friday morning, April 8, at 10. The details of the unique ceremony-- which is expected to last 3 hours-- are laid out in the apostolic constitution, Universi Dominici Gregis , promulgated by Pope John Paul in 1996. That document, setting the procedures for the burial of one Pontiff and the election of a successor, stipulates that a Pope's funeral, should be held between 4 and 6 days after his death. Pope John Paul died in the...

ROMA, April 28, 2005 -On Sunday, April 24, Benedict XVI inaugurated his “Petrine ministry as bishop of Rome”in the sunlight of a Saint Peter’s Square overflowing with crowds. But his first intention was different. He had wanted to celebrate his first solemn mass as pope, not in the square, but inside the basilica of Saint Peter. “Because there the architecture better directs the attention toward Christ, instead of the pope,” he told the masters of ceremonies on Wednesday, April 20, his first full day as the elected pope. Only the immense number of faithful who were coming induced him to...

In 1974, a Trabant -- an old East German car -- was chugging through the Thuringian countryside, a province in the communist German Democratic Republic.In its passenger seat sat Professor Joseph Ratzinger and at the wheel was Father Joachim Wanke, then an assistant at a local seminary -- the only one in the GDR.The two priests, writes Rainer Erice, a journalist for the German radio station Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk Thüringen (MDR), were on a harmless sightseeing tour, taking in the historic cities of Jena and Weimar. It was a moment of relaxation during Father Ratzinger's short visit to East Germany, the...

I spent quality time in the morning of Tuesday, April 19, 2004, reading up any thing I could find on the internet about Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, and by noon that day, I was almost certain, and had even begun to say it to those around me, that Ratzinger would most likely replace late John Paul II as pope of the Roman Catholics. Perhaps, I was not just guessing, but merely expressing some latent wish, tucked away somewhere in the inner recesses of my mind. Indeed, after examining some portions of Cardinal Ratzinger's pre-conclave homily delivered at St. Peter's Square the...

Amid the reactions to the elevation of Joseph Ratzinger to the papacy, there have been some doozies. My favorite came from a furious Ms. Cokie Roberts on Tuesday's night's Nightline. She must have been venting something fierce all evening, because Ted Koppel, none too pleased himself, introduced her with these words: "Cokie Roberts, you, you were, I gather, able to contain your enthusiasm, when you heard the news." Whereupon Cokie shot back with this. (And if looks could kill, Nightline would have lost its entire viewership, such as it is.) Well, this, this choice is really something that is different...

THE PAPACY is the oldest and most successful institution in the world. Asking the Pope to abandon or water down Catholic doctrine would be like asking him to abolish his own office. Joseph Ratzinger has been the most powerful figure in the Church after John Paul II for the past two decades. It is entirely right that he should have the opportunity to serve the Church in the capacity for which he is so obviously head and shoulders above the rest. Among so many eminences, he was pre-eminent. As usual, the BBC got the story all wrong. The task for...

Washington - German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Vatican theologian who was elected Pope Benedict XVI, intervened in the 2004 US election campaign ordering bishops to deny communion to abortion rights supporters including presidential candidate John Kerry. In a June 2004 letter to US bishops enunciating principles of worthiness for communion recipients, Ratzinger specified that strong and open supporters of abortion should be denied the Catholic sacrament, for being guilty of a "grave sin." He specifically mentioned "the case of a Catholic politician consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws," a reference widely understood to mean Democratic candidate...

After the dust has settled -- after the processions are over and the Masses have been said, after the new pope has accustomed himself to new apartments, new tasks, new vestments -- Benedict XVI will face an extraordinary list of problems, ranging from the bioethical to the geopolitical. But for this German pope, among his toughest tasks by far will be the battle for acceptance on the continent of his birth. It sounds paradoxical, given the European splendor in which the church has been cloaked for the past several weeks -- the scenes of Rome, St. Peter's Square, the Sistine...

London's Sunday Times would have us believe that one of the leading contenders for the papacy is a closet Nazi. In if-only-they-knew tones, the newspaper informs readers that German-born Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was a member of the Hitler Youth during World War II and suggests that, because of this, the "panzer cardinal" would be quite a contrast to his predecessor, John Paul II. The article also classifies Ratzinger as a "theological anti-Semite" for believing in Jesus so strongly that – gasp! – he thinks that everyone, even Jews, should accept him as the messiah. To all this we should say,...

If you are a blogger not posting for some time, you are often punished by a hard choice what story to comment on next. The tragic legally sanctioned death by starvation of Terri Schiavo ? Death of John Paul II and the mass outpouring of sympathy for the great deceased Pontiff ? Attacks on Tom Delay ? Finally, I've decided to comment on a different event--a joyful one--today's election of a new Pope, a German cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who took a name Benedict XVI.

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today welcomed the election of German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as the new pope, Benedict XVI. Under his leadership in Germany and Rome, the Catholic Church made important strides in improving Catholic-Jewish relations and atoning for the sin of anti-Semitism. Cardinal Ratzinger has been a leader in this effort and has made important statements in the spirit of sensitivity and reconciliation with the Jewish people. Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National director, issued the following statement: "We welcome the new Papacy of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. From the Jewish perspective, the fact that he comes from Europe is important,...

Despite the nonstop speculation surrounding the conclave that opens April 18, the press seems to have at least one thing right: in the early stages: The balloting will likely shape up as a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to the candidacy of German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the so-called “Panzer-Kardinal” who for 24 years was John Paul’s top doctrinal czar. Given the strong, polarizing stands Ratzinger has taken, it’s not clear that there are really 77 votes for him among the 115 voting cardinals, the number it would take to achieve a two-thirds majority. On the other hand, Ratzinger’s strong base of support...