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12 October 2003
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Vatican:
‘Pray for Pope’ call not meant to alarm
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Vatican: ‘Pray for Pope’ call not meant to alarm
Pope John Paul II admires a statue held by President Rolandas Paksas of Lithuania during a private audience at the Vatican
A senior Vatican official,
German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, has asked Catholics to pray for Pope John Paul
II - not out of any new sense of alarm, but because the Pontiff continues to struggle
with infirmity.
The cardinal’s personal secretary, Mons Georg Ganswein, downplayed a report by the German magazine Bunte, which quoted Cardinal Ratzinger as saying in an interview:
“(The Pope) is in a bad way,” and “We should pray for the Pope.”
Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, had not given an interview to the magazine, he said.
What happened, he said, was that Cardinal Ratzinger had been explaining to representatives of two German beer companies why the Pope could not grant them a private audience.
And journalists in the group had apparently picked up some of the cardinal’s comments.
Mons Ganswein stated: “The cardinal said: ‘Certainly, we all have to pray for the Pope. The Pope himself asked us to do this.’
“But that is something that can be said at any time,” the monsignor said.
As for the Pope’s health, Cardinal Ratzinger had been “more or less expressing what anyone can see with their eyes and hear with their ears, that the Pope is not well and speaks only with difficulty”.
“All this was not said in any manner that could give a sense of alarm. Not at all.
“To present this as a piece of news is a complete exaggeration.”
Pope John Paul II’s closest aide has also downplayed concerns about the Pope’s health, although an Austrian cardinal has said the Pontiff is approaching “the last days and months of his life”.
Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn said: “The entire world is experiencing a Pope who is sick, who is disabled, and who is dying - I don’t know how near death he is - who is approaching the last days and months of his life.”
The cardinal’s spokesman later said his remarks were intended “philosophically”.
At the Vatican on the same day, new events were added to the Pope’s already heavy October schedule.
And Polish Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, the Pope’s longtime personal secretary, told reporters jokingly that many journalists who have predicted the Pope’s demise “are already in heaven”.
No one at the Vatican, including the Pope himself, has tried to hide the 83-year-old pontiff’s increasing frailty and weakness in recent weeks.
He is unable to stand or walk, and in several public appearances has had difficulty speaking.
But chatting with reporters as the Pope met Lithuanian President Rolandas Paksas in an adjacent room, Archbishop Dziwisz did not seem unduly concerned about the Pope’s health.
The Pope suffers from a degenerative neurological disorder believed to be Parkinson’s disease, and has also been slowed by arthritis of the knee and the effects of several surgeries.
The Vatican has said that he will lead two major events on October 21-22 with the 30 new cardinals he named in late September.
At the public consistory on October 21, the Pope will induct the appointees into the College of Cardinals and hand each cardinal the traditional “red hat”.
On October 22, the Pope will concelebrate Mass with the new cardinals in St Peter’s Square.
During the liturgy, he will present each cardinal with a ring designating his new office.
Vatican sources said that despite the Pope’s health problems no serious consideration had been given to abbreviating the traditional ceremonies.
Since the time of Pope Paul VI, they said, the pope has celebrated Mass with the new cardinals the day after the consistory to distribute the rings.
The October 21-22 ceremonies will add two main events on to one of the most intense weeks of Pope John Paul’s pontificate.