Pope Releases La Sapienza Address

(17 Jan 08 -RV) The Press Office of the Holy See has released the text of the speech Pope Benedict was scheduled to give today at Rome’s La Sapienza University. Chris Altieri reports…

Script

The relation of reason to rationality, and the reasonability of the catholic faith were the holy father’s major themes in the remarks he prepared for delivery during the formal opening of the academic year at Rome’s La Sapienza University.

Pope Benedict said his invitation to speak as bishop of Rome sets the tone for his remarks, because the bishop of Rome speaks as the representative of a believing community, which has throughout the long centuries of her existence nurtured and developed a clear and recognizable wisdom in matters of living; the pope therefore speaks as the representative of a community that carries within itself a great treasure of ethical experience, which is of significance for all humanity; in this sense, said pope Benedict, the bishop of Rome speaks as the representative of ethical reason.

The early Christians recognized themselves in the ancient Greek tradition of philosophical inquiry that rejected magic and superstition, and sought the truly divine source of life and order.

The first Christians, said pope Benedict, did not embrace their faith positivistic-ally, nor did they welcome it as an escape from unfulfilled desires; the first Christians welcomed the faith as the force that dispelled the cloud of mythological religion, and made room for the discovery of the god who is at once creative and loving reason.

Pope Benedict went on to say that human nature wants to know, it desires truth.

Truth, said the Holy Father, is first and foremost a matter of seeing, of comprehending , of theoria, as the Greek tradition calls it.

Truth, however, is never merely theoretical.

In correlating the beatitudes of the sermon on the mount with the gifts of the holy spirit in the book of the prophet Isaiah, St. Augustine affirmed a reciprocity between knowledge and sadness: Augustine says merely knowing makes us sad.

In point of fact, said the Holy Father, the person who learns only about all that happens in the world ends up grieved.

the Pope said truth means more than merely knowing.

Knowing the truth is aimed at knowing the good.

The Holy Father said truth makes us good, and goodness is true: this is the optimism that lives in the Christian faith.

The faith, said pope Benedict, may only be given in freedom, and the pope may never impose it.

It is, said the Holy Father, the Pope’s job to maintain a high level of sensitivity toward the truth.