THEOLOGIAN ENCOURAGED BY CARDINAL RATZINGER “Theological research must involve risk”. That’s the advice Joseph Ratzinger gave to a young theologian, Jesuit Paolo Gamberini, now Visiitng Professor at Santa Clara - JST when the cardinal was at head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. Professor Gamberini, remembered Ratzinger’s words during a presentation of one of his books on Jesus by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini at the Pontifical Lateran University on February, 10, 2007. When Joseph Ratzinger was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he was seen as a strict guardian of Catholic orthodoxy. But few people know that he used to encourage young theologians to take risks in their research. It was a very interesting meeting because I explained to him that I had some difficulties sometimes... to promote risky theories that could be in charge of faith or not, and he said: well, first of all it’s very important to dialogue not only among scholars but with people within the Church. Jesuit father Paolo Gamberini, 47, remembers a meeting with Cardinal Ratzinger to discuss his research in 1997. The Jesuit revealed to the public Cardinal Ratzinger’s advice. I asked him: what kind of advice can you give me? And Ratzinger said: first of all, it’s good to work on your research, to be ready to take risks in research. But also to be ready to learn and to dialogue. So, these two advices, to take risks in my theological research and ready to dialogue, have been for me the mainstream of my theological inquiry and task. A lesson, which Gamberini says gave him the freedom to explore new ideas.If you have an intuition, or an insight, you need to have on one side the readiness to develop it, but also the humility to be in dialogue. And so, yes, there were some fears from my side, but if you live those fear in the faith to Jesus and in loving affection toward the Church you should not fear anything at all because… keep on going … And Gamberini did. He is now on the West Coast of the States, at Santa-Clara JST teaching Systematic Theology
Posted on: Tue, 14 Oct 2014 14:56:39 +0000
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