FREIBURG, Germany (VI) — Benedict XVI issued an unusual and sincere warning while in Freiburg during his visit to Germany:It is better to be a searching agnostic than a fake believer.
During the Mass that was celebrated this morning at the airport in Freiburg, in the last day of his German visit, Benedict XVI praised the “agnostics who cannot find peace due to their questions about God, people who suffer because of our sins and are desirous of a pure heart”.
They are “closer to the Kingdom of God than ‘routine’ believers who only see the apparatus of the Church without their hearts being touched by faith”.
Pope Benedict launched a strong appeal to “unite” the Church in Germany and maintain a strong bond with Rome. The Pope’s call responds to the demands for reform in various areas — such as the question of remarried divorcees, priestly celibacy and the ordination of women — and also the anti-Rome pressure from sectors of the German Church.
“The renewal of the Church,” the Pope warned, “can only come about through the willingness to convert and through a renewal of faith.” The German Pope, aware that the ill-feeling towards the Vatican’s failure to respond to requests for renewal is most felt in his homeland, Germany, and in Austria, warned that “the Church in Germany will overcome the great challenges of the present and future and will remain yeast in society, if the priests, consecrated persons and lay believers in Christ, loyal to their own specific vocation, work together in unity”.