Scottish Catholic Observer

From his historic address to the German parliament to his farewell address, Pope Benedict XVI highlighted the need for religious guidance in the public square and from the pulpit during his visit to Germany.

The Holy Father’s reference to Nazism as an example of what can happen when social justice is set aside hit home when he spoke in the Bundestag.

Christian unity and interfaith dialogue were also at the forefront of the Pope’s mission while visiting his homeland. He met with members of the Jewish and Muslim communities, the German Evangelical Church Council, the Orthodox Churches, Catholic seminarians and lay Catholics last week.

In addition to his call for continued cooperation between faiths and churches, the Holy Father highlighted the challenges of secular society—such as attempts to legalise same-sex marriage and euthanasia, issues that Scotland is also dealing with—and the need for the Church to ultimately to ‘set aside Her worldliness.’

“In order to accomplish Her true task adequately, the Church must constantly renew the effort to detach Herself from the ‘worldliness’ of the world,” he told Catholic Association members on Sunday. “… One could almost say that history comes to the aid of the Church here through the various periods of secularisation, which have contributed significantly to Her purification and inner reform.”

And while the Pope’s message was largely well received, some suggested it did not go far enough. The Rev Nikolaus Schneider, leader of Germany’s Lutheran Church, told the Pope that ‘it is time to take real steps for reconciliation.’

However, as Wolfgang Mossinger, the German Consul General in Scotland, put most eloquently, a Papal visit is not the time nor place to make a reconciliation decision. Any perceived disappointment over issues not addressed during the Papal visit to Germany were surely overcome by the Holy Father’s message that society must address its failings. Indeed a message for all.