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By Daniel Burke
c. 2008 Religion News Service

NEW YORK -- Pope Benedict XVI ended his first trip to America on Sunday (April 20) with a Mass for more than 50,000 at Yankee Stadium that celebrated 200 years of the Catholic Church in America and exhorted his flock to "use wisely the blessings of freedom."

"Past generations have left you an impressive legacy," the pope said to the tens of thousands gathered in every seat of the famed stadium.

"In our day too, the Catholic community in this nation has been outstanding in its prophetic witness in the defense of life, in the education of the young, in care for the poor, the sick and the stranger in your midst. On these solid foundations, the future of the church in America must even now begin to rise!"

Earlier Sunday, Benedict paused for a poignant prayer ceremony at the site of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, offering prayers for the victims and those "whose hearts and minds are consumed by hatred."

The pope is scheduled to board "Shepherd One" and fly back to Rome Sunday at 8:30 p.m.
As Benedict's popemobile circled the field for the final event of his six-day American visit, the cheering crowd shot to its feet and began waving kerchiefs in the papal colors of yellow and white.

The American church's revival must be spiritual, the pope said, for "all structures, associations, and programs, valuable or even essential as they may be, ultimately exist only to support the deeper unity, which, in Christ, is God's ... gift to his church."

As in previous addresses during his visit, Benedict's homily tackled a number of themes, including the place of religion in the public square, the need for young men in the priesthood, the dangers of relativism and "the false gospels of freedom and happiness." He made a passing reference to the sexual abuse scandal, but not with the depth of previous days.

With purple and yellow papal flags flapping in the wind, the 81-year-old shepherd of America's 65 million Catholics highlighted the 200th anniversary of dioceses in New York, Philadelphia and Bardstown, Ky., (now Louisville) and the archdiocese of Baltimore.

Earlier, after a moment of silent prayer at ground zero, the pope was escorted to a pool of water and exposed earth where the twin towers of the World Trade Center once stood. Benedict lit a candle, prayed and blessed the ground with holy water.

Survivors of the attacks, first responders from New York City's fire and police departments, and government officials greeted and spoke briefly with Benedict at ground zero.

"O God of love, compassion, and healing, look on us people of many different faiths and traditions, who gather today at this site, the scene of incredible violence and pain," the pope prayed.

After asking for "light and peace" for the police and fire officers who responded to the attack and compassion for its nearly 3,000 victims, Benedict also implored God to "turn to your way of love those whose hearts and minds are consumed with hatred."

Sunday's Mass capped six emotional days for Benedict during which he has opened a side of himself not seen by many Americans. On his way to the United States on Tuesday, the pope deplored the "great shame to me personally" brought on by the clergy sex scandal, met on Thursday with victims of sexual abuse, and spoke repeatedly of the "enormous pain" the scandal has wrought on his church.

At a youth rally on Saturday, Benedict offered a rare glimpse at his teenage years in Germany, lamenting the "sinister regime" of the Nazis, which he called "a monster." At a Saturday morning Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral with Catholic clergy, the pope said that he is "a man with his faults," and asked for their prayers.

As Mario St. Francis, 30, gazed at the massive yellow and purple stage assembled on the infield of Yankee Stadium, he said he felt he'd come to know Benedict over the last week.

"His comments about the priest sex scandal -- that was awesome to hear," said St. Francis, a lay missionary. "And his private meeting with the victims -- I saw a pope who cares."

Before the pope arrived, as the sounds of the Harlem Gospel Choir and Harry Connick Jr.'s live performances resounded through the stadium, the Rev. Henry Schreitmueller said Benedict "has proven himself to be a lot more human" than many had thought.

"He's doing the same thing we learn to do when we're in a new parish, he's learning how to pastor to people," said the 77-year-old retired priest from Nutley, N.J. Schreitmueller said he was not happy when Benedict was elected pope three years ago but lately, he said, he's come to admire his fellow German.

Watching people wait patiently in line for snacks, Pat Nelson, 55, from Folcroft, Pa., said it seemed Benedict's visit made people a little nicer, a bit more polite, at least for now.

Copyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of
this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written
permission.

Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa) - April 17, 2008

Washington (dpa) - Pope Benedict XVI greeted leaders of other faiths in the United States in a meeting Thursday in Washington, continuing the interfaith contacts that have not always gone well in the first three years of his papacy.

While declaring his intention to build on the work of his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, Benedict set off a firestorm in the Muslim world in September 2006, when he quoted a medieval Byzantine emperor's description of Islam as "evil and inhuman."

A former professor of theology, Benedict was using the citation to make a point about violence and religion, without endorsing the 14th- century statement, in a much broader lecture against secularism.

But it sparked fierce protests in many Muslim countries. A Catholic nun in Somalia was killed in the wake of the uproar, and attacks on Christians took place in other countries including Iraq.

"In our attempt to discover points of commonality, perhaps we have shied away from the responsibility to discuss our differences with calmness and clarity," Benedict said Thursday. "While always uniting our hearts and minds in the call for peace, we must also listen attentively to the voice of truth."

His meeting on the campus of Catholic University included representatives from Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and Jain communities in the United States.

Citing the US history of religious freedom and separation of church and state, guaranteed since the US Constitution of 1787, Benedict encouraged "all religious groups in America to persevere in their collaboration and thus enrich public life with the spiritual values that motivate your action in the world."

"The task of upholding religious freedom is never completed," he said. "New situations and challenges invite citizens and leaders to reflect on how their decisions respect this basic human right."

Benedict noted "a growing interest among governments to sponsor programs intended to promote interreligious and intercultural dialogue. These are praiseworthy initiatives."

"As we grow in understanding of one another, we see that we share an esteem for ethical values, discernable to human reason, which are revered by all peoples of goodwill. The world begs for a common witness to these values," he said.

"I therefore invite all religious people to view dialogue not only as a means of enhancing mutual understanding, but also as a way of serving society at large."

The German-born pontiff has drawn occasional criticism from Jewish communities, most recently for his reintroduction earlier this year of a Latin prayer for the conversion of Jews to Christianity.

On Thursday, immediately after addressing the interfaith group, Benedict gathered with a group of US Jews to deliver greetings for Passover, which begins Saturday night.

He wished "peace to the Jewish community in the United States and throughout the world" for the annual feast, saying he was motivated by "our common spiritual heritage."

"I wish to reaffirm the Second Vatican Council's teaching on Catholic-Jewish relations and reiterate the church's commitment to the dialogue that in the past 40 years has fundamentally changed our relationship for the better."

As part of the so-called Vatican II, the church in 1965 explicitly rejected old notions of Jewish collective guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus, and since then Christians and Jews have experienced "growth in trust and friendship," Benedict said.

The papal tour moves Friday to New York, where the pope is expected to make an informal visit at a Manhattan synagogue before meeting with US leaders of other Christian denominations.

Copyright 2008 dpa Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH

By Jonathan Rubin
c. 2008 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON -- As the sun rose over the sparkling new Nationals Park baseball stadium, the weather turned from chilly to warm to downright glorious -- not unlike the feelings many Catholics here expressed for their new pope.

As Pope Benedict XVI met 46,000 members of his American flock for the first time on Thursday (April 17), there was a palpable sense of newfound love for a man still trying to emerge from the shadow of Pope John Paul II.

"God makes us all different," said Friar Matt Foley, a teacher at Archbishop Curley High School in Baltimore. "He's just like anybody else ... new on the job."

It's been three years since Benedict's election, yet more than 80 percent of Americans don't know much or anything about the pope, according to a recent poll. Part of the (unofficial) reason for the pope's six-day trip was for both sides to get acquainted.

Benedict was originally viewed as a strict and bookish theologian likely to enforce a more conservative orthodoxy on the U.S. church, but a new pope is emerging. This pope is interested in the environment, eager to personally apologize for the priest sex abuse scandal, and capable of showing warmth that belies his age.

"I looked into his eyes and I thought, `These aren't old eyes,"' said Elizabeth Mandapat, from Phillips, Md., who arrived at the stadium before 6 a.m. "I feel so energized. ... It's like I didn't need any sleep."

It's almost as if the man once derided as "God's Rottweiler" has finally become the "German Shepherd" advertised on so many bumper stickers and T-shirts for sale.

The Mass, like the church in general, attracted the faithful and faith-shaken alike. Some have seen their beliefs weakened by war, death or misdeeds by the Catholic Church itself.

Those with deep faith, however, say they find its depths to be bottomless. Being close to the pontiff is "like getting closer and closer to Christ," said Mother Maria Della Caridad, a member of the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara in Washington.

The faithful who packed the new stadium said the crowds made it feel like they were surrounded by "one big family." Not every seat had a clear view of the pope, and in the nosebleed seats at the top, one woman shrugged when she was asked if she could hear what the pope was saying.

"Not really," she said.

But for most, the pope's message of hope was clear.

Martha Onate came from Chicago to stand outside Nationals Park. "I didn't have tickets," she said, "but I came for the blessing." She will follow the pope to New York by train.

And for some, the Mass served as an opportunity to sacrifice and achieve holiness, even if that meant not being there to see the pope.

Murphy Taylor, of Leonardtown, Md., won a ticket in a church lottery, but because he's too young to receive Communion, he gave his coveted papal ticket to his older brother, Cullen.

"We didn't even bribe him to do that," his father said. "But he'll be getting a big present when we get home."

Copyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.

By Jeff Diamant
c. 2008 Religion News Service

They gathered in the Italian hillside town of Assisi.

In October 1986, at the place where St. Francis famously preached repentance in the 1200s, top representatives from 15 religions stood together and prayed, one at a time, for peace.

The event was convened by Pope John Paul II, who came under criticism by conservative Catholics for appearing to treat all faiths as equally valid.

One of those critics was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. Over the years, Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, has come to praise the Assisi event, recently calling it a "moment of grace."

On Thursday (April 17), in a different sort of interreligious event, he will meet with and receive religious gifts from Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist and Hindu leaders at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center in Washington, D.C.

For the most part, Benedict has kept to the path set by John Paul to strengthen Vatican relations with non-Catholic religions.

In the first three years of his papacy, Benedict has visited a synagogue and mosque, following in the footsteps of John Paul, the first pope to do so.

Benedict plans another synagogue visit, on Friday in Manhattan. And meetings with a group of 138 Muslim clerics and Vatican officials are planned to start later this year.

At the same time, Benedict has sometimes taken a less conciliatory
-- critics say less diplomatic -- tack on interreligious issues:

-- In a September 2006 lecture at the University of Regensburg in Germany, he quoted a 14th century Byzantine emperor who called the prophet Muhammad's religious innovations "evil and inhuman."

-- His decision to relax restrictions on the Latin Mass upset Jewish leaders because of a Good Friday prayer that called for the conversion of the Jews.

-- He reaffirmed a controversial Vatican statement from 2000 that criticized other Christian denominations as defective, especially Protestant ones.

"John Paul and Benedict are two different men," said Scott Appleby, a history professor at the University of Notre Dame. "They have different sensibilities, different temperaments, different emphases.

They share 99.99 percent of the worldview. It's the .01 percent we're talking about."

It is Benedict's relations with Muslims that have drawn the most attention.

Thousands protested in Muslim countries over the line from his 2006 Regensburg comments, which seemed included to illuminate a point about religion and reason. Some of the protests turned violent.

Whether Benedict meant for the line to be provocative is unclear. He later said he was sorry people were offended. Afterward, 138 Muslim theologians signed an open letter calling for Catholic-Muslim dialogue.

"John Paul's style was, for the most part, with Muslims, to play down any conflict," said John L. Allen, a Vatican correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter, adding that John Paul met with Muslim groups 60 times.

"With Benedict, his attitude is, those bridges having been built (by John Paul), it's now time to walk across them, that we have to get past the `tea and cookies' stage and talk about real issues."

Benedict's desire to boost Vatican ties with certain Christian groups sometimes trumps the delicate sensitivities of interreligious dialogue, Appleby said.

"Pope Benedict's heart is really in reunification or serious dialogue with other Christians," Appleby said. "He believes Christianity is on its heels around the world and he wants a very vigorous leadership that restores Christianity to its central place in culture and in society."

In July 2007, Benedict tried to bring a group of traditionalist Catholic schismatics back into the fold by relaxing restrictions on when a 450-year-old Latin Mass -- known as the "Tridentine Mass" -- could be said.

The move by Benedict, however, irked Jewish groups because of the Good Friday prayer for conversion. Later that month, Benedict angered Protestants by restating the essence of an 8-year-old church statement called "Dominus Iesus" that he had co-signed, as a cardinal, in 2000.

The document said Protestant groups are not "churches in the proper sense" because they lack the "apostolic succession" that the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches claim traces their origins back to Jesus' 12 apostles.

The Vatican said the statement meant to correct wrong impressions about church doctrine. Critics found it gratuitously divisive.

The moves, however, were in keeping with Benedict's priorities, Allen said.

"When this pope is forced to make a choice of promoting values, between those things that strengthen Catholic identity and those things that maybe at the same time risk being misunderstood by the outside world, his instinct is always to go with Catholic identity."

(Jeff Diamant is a staff writer for The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.)

Copyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.

By Daniel Burke and Adelle M. Banks
c. 2008 Religion News Service
WASHINGTON -- Pope Benedict XVI told the nation's Catholic bishops Wednesday (April 16) that they must heal the "enormous pain" caused by the clergy sexual abuse scandal by ministering to victims, guiding demoralized priests and confronting sexual immorality in the wider culture.

"It is your God-given responsibility as pastors to bind up the wounds caused by every breach of trust, to foster healing, to promote reconciliation and to reach out to those so seriously wronged," Benedict said.

More than 350 cardinals and bishops attended the evening Vespers service in the crypt of the Basilica of the National Shrine to hear the leader of the world's 1 billion Catholics deliver his most sweeping comments to date on the sexual abuse scandal in the U.S. church.

While Benedict touched on a wide range of topics, from a "quiet attrition" within the U.S. Catholic Church to a decline in new priests, he devoted substantial time in his sharply worded speech to address the "deep shame" of the sex scandal.

It was the second time in as many days that the pope has spoken on the issue, one that many U.S. Catholics had hoped -- but few expected -- would be a major theme of his first U.S. trip.

Nearly 14,000 abuse claims have been filed against Catholic clergy since 1950, according to church figures, and the fallout has cost the U.S. church more than $2 billion and bankrupted six dioceses.

Addressing the pope, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the scandal was "sometimes very badly handled by bishops."

Benedict agreed, but cast the scandal in a wider lens, which he said should prompt the bishops to "address the sin of abuse within the wider context of sexual mores."

"What does it mean to speak of child protection when pornography and violence can be viewed in so many homes through media widely available today?" he asked.

Moreover, the pope acknowledged that many priests feel isolated and shamed by the scandal.

"At this stage a vital part of your task is to strengthen relationships with your clergy, especially cases where tension has arisen between priests and their bishops in the wake of the crisis,"
Benedict said.

David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said words -- even those of the pope -- have "very limited effect."

"We've not seen the Vatican punish any complicit church employee, from a church janitor to a bishop," Clohessy said in an interview before Benedict's address to the bishops.

At the basilica, Benedict's sharpest remarks came in response to advance questions from the bishops.

Speaking to a church that, according to a recent survey, loses one out of every three members, the pope said: "Do people today find it difficult to encounter God in our churches? Has our preaching lost its salt?"

Asked about the dearth of young priests, Benedict said, "Let us be quite frank: The ability to cultivate vocations to the priesthood and the religious life is a sure sign of the health of a local church."

Earlier Wednesday, Benedict was met at the White House in grand style by President Bush with an ornate ceremony that featured thousands of onlookers who greeted the pope by singing "Happy Birthday."

Benedict, smiling as he opened his arms to an adoring crowd of some 9,000 well-wishers, said he came "as a guest of all Americans."

Bush clearly reveled in the pomp and circumstance of only the second papal visit to the White House, and thanked Benedict for spending his 81st birthday in America.

"Birthdays are traditionally spent with close friends, so our entire nation is moved and honored that you've decided to share this special day with us," Bush said.

After the 45-minute welcome ceremony, which included a 21-gun salute customary for a foreign head of state, Bush and Benedict met in the Oval Office, where they discussed terrorism, global poverty, immigration and the Middle East.

A joint statement from the White House and the Holy See said the two men "reaffirmed their total rejection of terrorism as well as the manipulation of religion to justify immoral and violent acts against innocents."

They also discussed "the defense and promotion of life, matrimony and the family," the "precarious state" of Christian minorities in Iraq, and poverty and disease in Africa.

In his public remarks at the White House, Benedict mentioned the need for "global solidarity" and "patient efforts of international diplomacy to resolve conflicts and promote progress" -- a veiled reference to the Vatican's earlier push for more negotiations before the U.S. launched its war against Iraq.

Benedict left the White House in the popemobile to travel for a luncheon at the Vatican embassy with U.S. cardinals. Outside the embassy, a group of victims of clergy sexual abuse released their list of "America's Worst Cardinals" who they said had failed to stop the abuse scandal.

Copyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.

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