BRITAIN-BISHOPS Sep-19-2010
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Pope tells British bishops
they must satisfy people's spiritual hunger
BIRMINGHAM, England (CNS) --
Meeting Catholic bishops at the end of his visit to Great Britain, Pope
Benedict XVI said he had spent four days witnessing signs of spiritual hunger
that bishops have an obligation to help satisfy.
Pope Benedict urged
Scottish, English and Welsh bishops to give people real spiritual nourishment,
not just easy or popular answers to their questions and doubts.
"As you proclaim the
coming of the kingdom -- with its promise of hope for the poor and the needy,
the sick and the elderly, the unborn and the neglected -- be sure to present in
its fullness the life-giving message of the Gospel, including those elements
which call into question the widespread assumptions of today's culture,"
the pope told the bishops Sept. 19 during a meeting at Oscott
College in Birmingham.
At the end of a trip that saw him become the first pope
to visit the Anglican archbishop of Canterbury's residence and the first pope
to pray in the Anglicans' Westminster Abbey, Pope Benedict also asked the
bishops again to be generous in welcoming Anglicans who want to enter into full
communion with the Roman Catholic Church.
The British bishops have
been criticized by some conservative Catholic commentators for an apparently
lukewarm reception of provisions Pope Benedict made last year that would allow
for the establishment of special church jurisdictions for former Anglicans who
want to maintain some of their Anglican heritage and practices.
The jurisdictions, known as
ordinariates, have not yet been established anywhere
in the world.
Some people involved in
efforts to promote full Anglican-Roman Catholic unity said the pope's special
provisions were essentially an admission that full unity was virtually
impossible because of the ordination of women priests and bishops and positions
on homosexuality in some parts of the Anglican Communion.
Speaking to the Catholic bishops, though, the pope said
his provision "should be seen as a prophetic gesture that can contribute
positively to the developing relations between Anglicans and Catholics" by
promoting unity while accepting differences.
The Rev. David Richardson,
director of the Anglican Center in Rome and the archbishop of Canterbury's
representative to the Vatican, said the idea of the ordinariate
was initially billed as a "pastoral provision" for disaffected
Anglicans and appears to offer benefits to them, but "seems to contribute
nothing to the full visible unity" of the Anglican and Roman Catholic
communities as a whole.
Full unity can only be
achieved through formal dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the
Anglican Communion as a whole, Rev. Richardson told Catholic News Service.
As the bishops seek to
evangelize "in a highly secular society," challenges come not only
from widespread public opinion on ethical issues like biotechnology, abortion
or homosexuality, he said, they also come from the current economic crisis and
people's assumptions about wealth and poverty.
"The specter of
unemployment is casting its shadow over many people's lives and the long-term
cost of the ill-advised investment practices of recent times is becoming all
too evident," he said.
As pastors of a Christian community,
the pope said, the British bishops must encourage their flocks to be generous
and stand in solidarity with the poor.
Pope Benedict told the
bishops he knows that the "shameful" clerical sex abuse crisis
"seriously undermines the moral credibility of church leaders."
"I have spoken on many
occasions of the deep wounds that such behavior causes -- in the victims first
and foremost -- but also in the relationships of trust that should exist
between priests and people, between priests and their bishops, and between the
church authorities and the public," he said.
The pope told the bishops
they must continue their efforts to reach out to the victims, to carefully
screen candidates for the priesthood and other church offices and "deal
properly and transparently with allegations as they arise."
The child protection
procedures developed by the Catholic Church in Great Britain over the past 10
years also should be shared with the wider community, the pope said, because
children continue to be victims of abuse in a variety of settings.
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Contributing to this story
was Cindy Wooden in London.
END