SUMMARY:
- THIRD
BOOK IN JOSEPH RATZINGER'S TRILOGY: "THE INFANCY NARRATIVES"
-
AUDIENCES
- OTHER
PONTIFICAL ACTS
______________________________________
THIRD
BOOK IN JOSEPH RATZINGER'S TRILOGY: "THE INFANCY NARRATIVES"
Vatican
City, 20 November 2012 (VIS) - "L'infanzia di Gesu" ("The
Infancy Narratives"), the third volume of Benedict XVI's trilogy
dedicated to Jesus of Nazareth, will be available in Italian
bookshops tomorrow, 21 November. The book, published in Italy by
Rizzoli and the Vatican Publishing House, will be released
simultaneously in several languages (Italian, German, Croatian,
French, English, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish) and in fifty
countries; the worldwide print run of the first edition will be more
than a million copies. In the coming months, the book will be
translated into twenty languages for publication in seventy-two
countries.
This
morning, in the Vatican's Sala Pio X, the book was presented to the
press. The speakers were Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the
Pontifical Council for Culture; Maria Clara Bingemer, professor of
theology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro; Fr.
Giuseppe Costa, director of the Vatican Publishing House; Paolo
Mieli, president of Rizzoli (RCS) Publications, and Fr. Federico
Lombardi S.J., director of the Holy See Press Office.
The book,
defined by its author as a "small antechamber" to the
trilogy on Jesus of Nazareth, is 176 pages long and comprises four
chapters, an Epilogue and a brief Foreword. A summary of the book is
given below:
"The
first chapter is dedicated to the genealogies of the Saviour in the
Gospels of Matthew and Luke, which are very different, although both
have the same theological and symbolic meaning: the placing of Jesus
in history and his true origin as a new beginning of world history.
"The
theme of chapter two is the annunciation of the birth of John the
Baptist and that of Jesus. Rereading the dialogue between Mary and
the Archangel Gabriel in the Gospel of Luke, Joseph Ratzinger
explains that, through a woman, God 'seeks to enter the world anew'.
In order to liberate man from sin, he writes, quoting Bernard of
Clairvaux, God needs 'free obedience' to his will. 'In creating
freedom, he made himself in a certain sense dependent upon man. His
power is tied to the unenforceable yes of a human being'. Thus, only
thanks to Mary's assent can the history of salvation begin.
"Chapter
three is centred on the event in Bethlehem and the historical context
of the birth of Jesus, the Roman Empire under Augustus, which extends
from East to West and whose universal dimension allows for the entry
into the world of 'a universal Saviour'; 'it is indeed the fullness
of time'. The single elements of the story of the birth are dense
with meaning: the poverty in which 'he who is truly the first-born of
all that is' chooses to reveal himself, and therefore 'the cosmic
glory' that envelopes the manger; God's special love for the poor,
which manifests itself in the annunciation to the shepherds; and the
words of the Gloria, whose translation is controversial.
"The
fourth chapter is dedicated to the three Magi, who saw the star of
the 'King of the Jews' and who had come to adore the child, and to
the flight into Egypt. Here the figures of the 'magoi', reconstructed
through a rich range of historical, linguistic and scientific
information, are outlined as a fascinating emblem of the inner unrest
and search for truth of the human spirit.
"Finally,
the Epilogue, with the story - according to the Gospel of Luke - of
the last episode in the childhood of Jesus, the last account we have
of him before the beginning of his public ministry with his baptism
in the Jordan. It is the episode of the three days during the
Passover pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem, in which
twelve-year-old Jesus leaves Mary and Joseph and stays in the Temple
to discuss with the rabbis. Jesus, who was growing 'in wisdom and in
stature, and in favour with God and man', manifests himself in his
nature as true God and, at the same time, true man, who 'thought and
learned in human fashion'".
AUDIENCES
Vatican
City, 20 November 2012 (VIS) - The Holy Father today received in
audience staff of the publishers of the book "L'infanzia di
Gesu" bu Joseph Ratzinger - -Benedict XVI.
OTHER
PONTIFICAL ACTS
Vatican
City, 20 November 2012 (VIS) - The Holy Father appointed:
- Msgr.
Gonzalo Alonso Calzada Guerrero, rector of the major seminary of
Celaya, Mexico as auxiliary bishop of Antequera (area 33,648,
population 1,477,000, Catholics 1,180,000, priests 183, permanent
deacons 24, religious 258), Mexico. The bishop-elect was born in San
Luis de la Paz, Mexico in 1964 and ordained a priest in 1989. He
studied Holy Scripture at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome
and has served in numerous pastoral roles.
- Bishop
Marian Chovanec, auxiliary of Nitra, Slovakia as bishop of Banska
Bystrica (area 6,750, population 614,800, Catholics 400,500, priests
172, permanent deacons 2, religious 406), Slovakia.
You
can find more information at: www.visnews.org
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