Posted on 09/01/2012 3:31:54 PM PDT by marshmallow
Italian Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini has described the Roman Catholic Church as being "200 years behind" the times.
The cardinal died on Friday, aged 85.
Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera has published his last interview, recorded in August, in which he said: "The Church is tired... our prayer rooms are empty."
Martini, once tipped as a future pope, urged the Church to recognise its errors and to embark on a radical path of change, beginning with the Pope.
Thousands of people have been filing past his coffin at Milan's cathedral, where he was archbishop for more than 20 years.
The cardinal, who had retired from the post in 2002, suffering from Parkinson's Disease, is to be buried on Monday.
'Old culture'
Martini, a popular figure with liberal stances on many issues, commanded great respect from both Pope John Paul II and his successor Pope Benedict XVI.
The cardinal - a member of the Jesuit religious order - was often critical in his writings and comments on Church teaching, says the BBC's David Willey in Rome.
He was a courageous and outspoken figure during the years he headed Europe's largest Catholic diocese, our correspondent says.
Cardinal Martini gave his last interview to a fellow Jesuit priest, Georg Sporschill, and to a journalist at the beginning of August when he knew his death was approaching.
The cardinal had returned to Italy from Jerusalem, where he had settled on retirement in 2002 to continue his biblical studies.
Catholics lacked confidence in the Church, he said in the interview. "Our culture has grown old, our churches are big and empty and the church bureaucracy rises up, our religious rites and the vestments we wear are pompous."
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.co.uk ...
I remember when Pope JPII died his name came up as a possibility for Pope. Traditional, faithful Catholics were not in favor of his election to the papacy because he had a history of liberal causes and interpretaiton of all the rules.
So God should bow to the wishes of man???
Hopefully, the church is 2000 years behind.
Sounds like he was promoted to a desk job, and then they took away his stapler.
Your Eminence, trust me on this: Modernity is overrated.
Exactly. There are plenty of "new wave" churches for the trendy parishioners. One of my neighbors belongs to a church that periodically holds a vote of the elders to determine how they will interpret the bible.
Martini had much to answer for during his particular judgment.
Cardinal Martini Has Had Too Many Martinis: Now Supporting Gay Marriage.
His argument in one sentence: “In order to grow we must stop stop standing for Truth and instead promote what’s popular.”
I wonder how he would explain the fact that Islam is the fastest growing religion - it isn’t 200 years behind the times but more like 1300?
Prayers for a misguided soul.
Although, I don't think he retired, so much as was told to retire.
I’m sure Cardinal Martini had his good points, but I’m glad that the Holy Spirit spared us his eminence’s presence on the chair of Peter.
Exactly. Shouldnt a true church be 2,000years behind the times?
The Church being 200 years behind the times makes me think of some wise words.
“The pure modernist is merely a snob; he cannot bear to be a month behind the fashion. ... As usual, the wisest men of the age are not dominated by the spirit of the age. ... A man with a definite belief always appears bizarre, because he does not change with the world; he has climbed into a fixed star and the earth whizzes below him like a zoetrope. Millions of mild black coated men call themselves sane and sensible merely because they always catch the fashionable insanity, because they are hurried into madness after madness by the maelstrom of the world. ... The real objection to modernism is simply that it is a form of snobbishness. It is an attempt to crush a rational opponent not by reason, but by some mystery of superiority, by hinting that one is especially up to date or ‘in the know’. ... To introduce into philosophical discussions a sneer at a creed’s antiquity is like introducing a sneer at a lady’s age. It is caddish because it is irrelevant.”
-G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936)
Great qoutes!!
yes, 200 years behind the rich elites in Europe and the US, but just about right for the rest of the world...
I am always amazed when people think that their little group is the “norm” for Christianity...
Parkinson’s is often accompanied by reduce mental capacity in the final stages.
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