Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, was born at Marktl am
Inn, Diocese of Passau (Germany) on April 16, 1927 (Holy Saturday) and
was baptised on the same day.
His father, a policeman, belonged to an
old family of farmers from Lower Bavaria of modest economic resources.
His mother was the daughter of artisans from Rimsting on the shore of
Lake Chiem, and before marrying she worked as a cook in a number of
hotels.
He spent his childhood and adolescence in Traunstein, a small
village near the Austrian border, 30 kilometres from Salzburg. In this
environment, which he himself has defined as "Mozartian", he received
his Christian, cultural and human formation.
His youthful years were not easy. His faith and the education
received at home prepared him for the harsh experience of those years
during which the Nazi regime pursued a hostile attitude towards the
Catholic Church. The young Joseph saw how some Nazis beat the parish
priest before the celebration of Mass.
It was precisely during that complex situation that he discovered the
beauty and truth of faith in Christ; fundamental for this was his
family’s attitude, who always gave a clear witness of goodness and hope,
rooted in a convinced attachment to the Church.
During the last months of the war he was enrolled in an auxiliary anti-aircraft corps.
From 1946 to 1951 he studied philosophy and theology in the Higher
School of Philosophy and Theology of Freising and at the University of
Munich.
He received his priestly ordination on 29 June 1951.
A year later he began teaching at the Higher School of Freising.
In 1953 he obtained his doctorate in theology with a thesis entitled
‘People and House of God in St Augustine’s Doctrine of the Church’.
Four years later, under the direction of the renowned professor of
fundamental theology Gottlieb Söhngen, he qualified for university
teaching with a dissertation on ‘The Theology of History in St
Bonaventure’.
After lecturing on dogmatic and fundamental theology at the Higher
School of Philosophy and Theology in Freising, he went on to teach at
Bonn, from 1959 to1963; at Münster from 1963 to 1966 and at Tübingen
from 1966 to 1969. During this last year he held the Chair of dogmatics
and history of dogma at the University of Regensburg, where he was also
Vice-President of the University.
From 1962 to 1965 he made a notable contribution to Vatican II as an
‘expert’; being present at the council as theological advisor of
Cardinal Joseph Frings, Archbishop of Cologne.
His intense scientific activity led him to important positions at the
service of the German Bishops’ Conference and the International
Theological Commission.
In 1972 together with Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac and
other important theologians, he initiated the theological journal Communio.
On March 25, 1977 Pope Paul VI named him Archbishop of Munich and
Freising. On May 28 of the same year he received episcopal ordination.
He was the first diocesan priest for 80 years to take on the pastoral
governance of the great Bavarian archdiocese.
He chose as his episcopal
motto "Cooperators of the truth". He himself explained why: "On the one
hand I saw it as the relation between my previous task as professor and
my new mission. In spite of different approaches, what was involved, and
continued to be so, was following the truth and being at its service.
On the other hand I chose that motto because in today’s world the theme
of truth is omitted almost entirely, as something too great for man, and
yet everything collapses if truth is missing.”
Paul VI made him a cardinal with the priestly title of Santa Maria Consolatrice al Tiburtino, during the consistory of June 27 of the same year.
In 1978 he took part in the conclave of August 25 and 26 which
elected John Paul I, who named him his Special Envoy to the III
International Mariological Congress, celebrated in Guayaquil (Ecuador)
from September 16 to 24. In the month of October of the same year he
took part in the conclave that elected Pope John Paul II.
He was Relator of the V Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of
Bishops which took place in 1980 on the theme: ‘Mission of the Christian
Family in the world of today’, and was Delegate President of the VI
Ordinary General Assembly of 1983 on ‘Reconciliation and Penance in the
mission of the Church’.
John Paul II named him Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine
of the Faith and President of the Pontifical Biblical Commission and of
the International Theological Commission on November 25, 1981. On
February 15, 1982 he resigned the pastoral governance of the Archdiocese
of Munich and Freising. The Holy Father elevated him to the Order of
Bishops assigning to him the Suburbicarian See of Velletri-Segni on
April 5, 1993.
He was President of the Preparatory Commission for the Catechism of
the Catholic Church, which after six years of work (1986-1992) presented
the new Catechism to the Holy Father.
On November 6, 1998 the Holy Father approved the election of Cardinal
Ratzinger as Vice-Dean of the College of Cardinals, submitted by the
Cardinals of the Order of Bishops.
On November 30, 2002 he approved his
election as Dean; together with this office he was entrusted with the
Suburbicarian See of Ostia.
In 1999 he was Special Papal Envoy for the Celebration of the XII
Centenary of the foundation of the Diocese of Paderborn, Germany which
took place on January 3.
Since November 13, 2000 he has been an Honorary Academic of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
In the Roman Curia he has been a member of the Council of the
Secretariat of State for Relations with States; of the Congregations for
the Oriental Churches, for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the
Sacraments, for Bishops, for the Evangelization of Peoples, for Catholic
Education, for Clergy and for the Causes of the Saints; of the
Pontifical Councils for Promoting Christian Unity, and for Culture; of
the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, and of the Pontifical
Commissions for Latin America, ‘Ecclesia Dei’, for the Authentic
Interpretation of the Code of Canon Law, and for the Revision of the
Code of Canon Law of the Oriental Churches.
Among his many publications special mention should be made of his Introduction to Christianity, a compilation of university lectures on the Apostolic Creed published in 1968; Dogma and Preaching (1973) an anthology of essays, sermons and reflections dedicated to pastoral arguments.
His address to the Catholic Academy of Bavaria on ‘Why I am still in
the Church’ had a wide resonance; in it he stated with his usual
clarity: "One can only be a Christian in the Church, not beside the
Church.”
His many publications are spread out over a number of years and
constitute a point of reference for many people especially for those
interested in entering deeper into the study of theology. In 1985 he
published his interview-book on the situation of the faith (The Ratzinger Report) and in 1996 Salt of the Earth. On the occasion of his 70th birthday the volume At the School of Truth was published, containing articles by several authors on different aspects of his personality and production.
He has received numerous Honoris Causa Doctorates, in 1984
from the College of St Thomas in St Paul, Minnesota; in 1986 from the
Catholic University of Lima; in 1987 from the Catholic University of
Eichstätt; in 1988 from the Catholic University of Lublin; in 1998 from
the University of Navarre; in 1999 from the LUMSA (Libera Università
Maria Santissima Assunta) of Rome and in 2000 from the Faculty of
Theology of the University of Wrocław in Poland.