GERMANY: Pope Benedict XVI pays a brief visit to the house of his brother, Georg Ratzinger, before blessing organ in old chapel in Regensburg

Pope Benedict took a trip down memory lane on Wednesday (September 13). The Vatican listed the day as a "private day" during which the pontiff visited his brother Monsignor Georg Ratzinger in Regensburg. Later, Benedict is expected to visit the cemetery where his parents and sister, Maria, are buried and spend the rest of the afternoon with his brother in his former home in Pentling. The only official appearance the Pope made was when blessing the new organ at the Alte Kapelle (Old Chapel) in Regensburg, appealing for harmony in the Catholic Church. The September 9th to 14th trip, his second to Germany in little more than a year, also gives him a chance to launch a European-wide appeal for the continent to rediscover a traditional faith that he feels is increasingly threatened by secularisation. Apart from Munich, the Pope has so far made a lightning visit to Marktl am Inn, where he was born and where he spent the first two years of his life. He also visited the shrine in the town of pilgrimage Altoetting and is spending two days in Regensburg before he departs on Thursday (September 14). The trip, Benedict's fourth abroad since his election in 2005, will also give him an opportunity to address concerns facing the Church in Germany, where Catholics make up around a third of a population of some 82.5 million people. Regensburg is the medieval city where the Pope taught theology from 1969 to 1977 and hoped to return in retirement from Vatican service to write one last major theological work. As Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he had twice asked Pope John Paul to let him retire from his job as the Vatican's top doctrinal official, but John Paul refused.

ITN Source | September 13, 2006

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