Pope Benedict addresses Croatia's intellectual elite

One of the key events on Pope Benedict's agenda during the first day of his pastoral visit to Croatia was a meeting with the country’s political, academic, business, diplomatic and religious leaders which was held in Zagreb’s National Theatre.

Our correspondent travelling with the pope is Tracey McClure and she filed this report on that encounter:

"It represents some of this country’s contradictions: based on Marshall Tito Square – a tribute to the former Communist leader who ruled the Yugoslav Republic with an iron fist – the 19^th c. National Theater’s elegant understatement takes your breath away. Representing the former glory and luxury of Franz Joseph’s Austro Hungarian empire, it rises majestically from the midst of this city, witness to so many conflicts and a crossroads between East and West. A place of refinement, of culture, of great minds like the ones gathered Saturday evening.

But if anyone was expecting contradictions to come out of Saturday’s encounter with Croatia’s intellectual elite, they were to be deluded. From the start, it was an invitation to unity – like the theme of this trip: “Together in Christ.”

Guests heard Zagreb University’s Professor of Medical ethics, Dr. Niko Zurak recall the “enormous contribution” of the Catholic church to education – a history going back hundreds of years with the establishment of Europe’s first institutions for learning. And in his address, the Pope said it was “crucial” to deepen our understanding of the Christian roots of the Continent’s many cultural and academic institutions – to know the why and how a university, artistic movement or hospital was born.

The Pope wanted to talk about “conscience” – fundamental, he said, to a free and just society. Was it this Christian conscience that formed the basis of the Europe we know today, starting with these academic, cultural and scientific institutions? Of course it was, the Holy Father was implying, and we need to remember that. The very “quality of social and civil life and the quality of democracy,” he said, “depends in large measure” on this conscience.

He warned against the prevailing “modern concept” that relegates conscience to the subjective – an area where there is no room for religion and morality. If we proceed down this path, he suggested, there can be no remedy to the crisis in the West, “and Europe is destined to collapse in on itself.”

But, always optimistic, the Pope said there is hope for the future “if conscience is rediscovered as the place in which to listen to truth and good…to remember our responsibility before God and before our fellow human beings.

Acknowledging the many leaders of different Christian churches and religions present, he said, “The Church rejoices in communion, in the richness of diversity” and we should remember that “religion is not a separate area marked off from society.” God, then, should be our reference point in seeking the common good, justice and reconciliation. And, religion must be a force for peace.

Pope Benedict held up the 18^th century Croat Jesuit scientist Ruder Boskovic whose mathematical calculations helped the Vatican repair the dome of St. Peter’s basilica in Rome, as a model of how faith and science can coexist - even “happily.” One does not necessarily mean the exclusion of the other.

“We must learn to appreciate the method, the mental openness” of such great men the Pope said. “It is by forming consciences that the church makes her most specific and valuable contribution to society.”

Recalling the purpose of this trip to celebrate Croatia’s first national day for Catholic families, the Pope said this contribution begins in the family and is reinforced in the parish, where kids and parents can deepen their knowledge of the scriptures – what he called the “great codex” of European culture. It is a community “built upon a gift, not upon economic interests or ideology, but upon love.”

Christian conscience he was saying, is based on “a logic of gratuitousness, learnt in infancy and adolescence” to be “lived out in every area of life, in games, in sport, interpersonal relations, art, volontary service to the poor and suffering.” Once the lesson of conscience is learnt, it is easy to apply to political and economic life and from here, to create a welcoming society which, he insisted, is “not falsely neutral, but rich in humanity with a strongly ethical dimension.”

And here, he invited lay faithful to “give generously of the formation they have received,” to share the Church’s social doctrine “for the sake of authentic secularism, social justice, the defence of life and of the family, freedom of religion and education.”

But getting back to this world of contradictions where a palatial Viennese theatre can stand regally in a former Communist square, it might be appropriate to recall Dr. Zurak’s reference to Max Planck who said “for the theologian everything begins with God, while for the scientist, everything ends with God” A contradiction? If you don’t think so, then you weren’t paying attention..
With Pope Benedict in the Croatian capital, I’m Tracey McClure"

Listen to the above report: