Some Interesting French And German Jesuit Practices In The 1960's

Doing God in the land of Mammon

By Christopher Howse
19/04/2008

An excerpt.

Modernity is a question that has interested Pope Benedict deeply. Just because he was 81 last Wednesday and wears funny clothes does not mean he is unaware of the way the world wags. In a fascinating new book about his ideas, Ratzinger's Faith (Oxford, £12.99), Tracey Rowland gives an instructive incident from 40 years ago to illustrate his perspective on the current age.

In 1968, the year of student demos - at his own university at Tübingen as much as at the Sorbonne - he was not shocked by bolshie intellectuals on the streets. What disturbed him was that on the barricades, Jesuit and Dominican priests were giving out Holy Communion to anyone, whether they shared the faith of the Church or not.

This might sound odd or unimportant, from an ordinary, secular point of view. But Pope Benedict, or Joseph Ratzinger as he was then, had developed a clear view of the Eucharist as literally embodying the Church. In other words, the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ is made what it is by the presence of God in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. This was an insight he derived from St Augustine, the fourth-century North African bishop.

Link to the full story (here)

Photo is of President Bill Clinton receiving the Eucharist