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| Cardinal Camillo Ruini's Mission to Pope Francis: Praying to the Lord, that the papal quest for the lost sheep does not cause difficulties for the faithful sheep |
(Rome) The Corriere della Sera published an extensive interview yesterday with Camillo Cardinal Ruini. The occasion was the publication of his new book C'è un dopo? La morte e la speranza (Is There a Thereafter? Death and the Hope) published by Mondadori. At the end of the interview the cardinal made a statement, "which has to do with the big question mark over the current pontificate," reports the daily newspaper Il Foglio :
"I ask the Lord that the indispensable search for the lost sheep does not trouble the conscience of the faithful sheep."
The petition expresses the wish that the misleading and ambiguous gestures and words of the reigning Pope for the benefit the non-believers, do not give rise to misunderstandings and overlook the faithful. The search for lost sheep should not lead to bringing the faithful sheep in danger.
This refers to spontaneous statements made by Francis for the press like those on (Islamic) terrorism, which is nothing compared to wars. Or the equally irritating statement about baptized Christians, who "kill" their mother-in-laws, and therefore are not much better quality than those two Islamic jihadists who, during Holy Mass, ritually slit the throat of a Catholic priest at the altar in Rouen and then decapitated him.
Cardinal Ruini's plea expressed concern that such irritating papal messages will probably not lead those who are distant to the faith, but are more likely to hurl the faithful into confusion and give rise to more or less intense, internal Church disputes and conflicts. This will not revive the ever apathetic acting Church in the West, but rather keep it from a renewal, says Il Foglio .
"The words of Ruini make another observation: The daily revolution triggered by the Bishop of Rome - always seems more inclined to engage in a dialogue with the non-Catholic world and not always to exhort the Catholics with fatherly tone - causes discomfort which is detected not only by columnists or so-called nostalgic traditionalists, but also by many Catholics who have no Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas lying on their bedside table. Ruini's gloss is an indication of a lack of orientation, with which the Italian episcopate dully stammers forward, which Ruini knows best, even now, where its fresh forces were grafted who are close to the new course, the search for shepherds with the smell of sheep," said Matteo Matzuzzi, the Vatican expert of Il Foglio .
Cardinal Ruini was the closest collaborator of Pope John Paul II. In Italy. From 1991-2008 he was Cardinal Vicar of Rome and at the same time from 1991-2007, President of the Italian Bishops' Conference. Ruini's rise in the Church began when the then auxiliary bishop of the diocese of Reggio Emilia and Guastalla in 1985 delayed the post-conciliar "swing" in Loreto at the second Italian "Church Congress", where he boldly countered the then progressive majority in the Italian episcopate, which was included then leading Cardinals, Anastasio Ballestrero OCD and Carlo Maria Martini SJ and the young Bruno Forte, who was then allowed to make the introductory speech, much as Cardinal Walter Kasper at the Cardinal Consistory in February 2014. Ballestrero was confirmed by Pope Paul VI. In 1977, as President of the Episcopal Conference. Ruini had taken a turn against the prevailing progressive majority within the Church which Pope John Paul II initiated and which was rejected by the progressives as "an atttempt at restoration." Already that year, Ruini was appointed by John Paul II as General Secretary of the Bishops' Conference.
