CHURCHES IN BRIEF
In the pastoral letters to the faithful for the Lenten period the bishops of Germany, Austria and Luxembourg call for the spiritual renewal of the Church. Follows an abstract of the bishops’ messages for the time leading up to Easter.Germany: the roots of faithUsing the Bible in place of Google is the exhortation of Msgr. Robert Zollitsch, president of the German Bishops’ Conference. "Instead of searching the web, it’s much more useful and reliable to take the Bible and let ourselves be guided and inspired by God", underlined Msgr. Zollitsch. The Archbishop of Freiburg calls for a change inside the Church: "All Catholics are called to take part in the spiritual dialogue for the future of the Church". For the Cardinal of Munich Reinhard Marx, "the Gospel is a living reality": "It isn’t obsolete or preserved in dusty books". The life of the Church shouldn’t be removed from contemporariness, "but this doesn’t mean adapting to the world and to temporary trends". The cardinal of Berlin Rainer Maria Woelki, recalled that the Lenten period of 40 days "is not a call to escape from the world". Conversely, "Christians are called to live the love for their neighbour in their daily lives". According to the archbishop Paderborn, Msgr. Hans-Josef Becker, "in the future the Church will increasingly thrive on small cells. That’s why she needs more faithful who will contribute with their talents to build a Church animated by the Spirit", in a "fruitful coexistence of lay people and religious". The bishop of Rottenburg-Stuttgart called upon the faithful to undertake "a respectful dialogue on the future of the Catholic Church" and "to provide opportunity for development to the process of dialogue and renewal inside the Church". Msgr. Gerhard Feige, bishop of Magdeburg, underlined the need for the Church "to take a stand within society for the dignity of the human person, for justice, and against extremism". Msgr. Heinrich Mussinghoff, bishop of Aachen, appealed to the faithful, inviting them "to nourish the roots of faith", and mentioned Benedict XVI’s visit to Germany. Luxembourg: using our timeIn the pastoral letter to the faithful of the archdiocese of Luxembourg, Msgr. Jean-Claude Hollerich, recalled the meaning of fasting as an occasion "to donate time". "Those who give up something are in fact gaining time", time "for God and time for people". "Taking time for others and for God means being always united in a relationship remaining oneself". "We can use our time in full awareness, if we manage to give up other things that take our time", continued Msgr. Hollerich: among these things the archbishop includes "reunions", "senseless squandering in the sector of leisure and the media and the lack of purpose", which "act as black holes", "invisibly consuming and destroying time".Austria: rediscovering interiorityDuring the liturgy of Ash Wednesday, celebrated in the St. Stephen’s dome in Vienna, cardinal Christoph Schönborn, president of the Austrian bishops’ conference and archbishop of the capital city highlighted the meaning of the Sacrament of Reconciliation and invited the faithful to rediscover it during Lent. "Let yourselves be reconciled with God", the cardinal exhorted: "The period of Lent is a time of grace and a very special period with God, when the skies are more open". Cardinal Schönborn said: "Lent provides the opportunity to put aside the external things in our lives and recover interiority". In this sense, the period can serve "to liberate ourselves". Msgr. Ägidius Zsifkovics, bishop of Eisenstadt, reiterated the original mission of the Church, the vision and the identity of Christians for Lent. "As an entire society, the Church is experiencing changes and crises that make her appear disoriented, paralyzed and obsolete. Internal and external ‘enterprise consultants’ have analysed and criticised the state of the Church in this situation". But the Church "is not a factory, faith is not merchandise, the fact that people are God’s children is not a value quoted on the stock exchange, priests are not organizers of events or entertainers. Optimization and recovery are not quotes from the Gospel. The Gospel, instead, is the love for God and for our neighbour, a love that can never be strong and great enough". Addressing himself to the faithful of his dioceses, Msgr. Manfred Scheuer of Innsbruck pointed out: "we are living critical times in our society, in the economy and inside the Church. But crises constitute an occasion for reflection" and "they can help us reconsider our centre, that is not a place of comfortable peace but rather a dynamic place, a source of that strength that is bestowed upon us through suffering and through Christ’s resurrection".
