Johan Schloemann on the Pope's intolerant concept of truth

Johan Schloemann analyses the address which Pope Benedict XVI intended to give at La Sapienza University. In response to protests, the university had withdrawn its invitation to the Pope – he did not deliver the lecture, but it was published online. Schloemann concludes, "This Pope's rhetorical trick is to use the concept of truth, employing formulas such as 'courage to speak the truth"' without differentiation on the scholarly questions of modernity and liberal society. He does so despite knowing better, as if 'truth' in the context of revelation and 'truth' in the context of critical reason, which is open to being falsified, were the same. That is brazen, conceptually speaking... Thwarted because of 'intolerance', the pope's academic lecture proclaims a concept of truth, veiled in a facile way, which is intolerant at its core. It is not that it is founded in Christian revelation alone – every one of the great religions must assert an 'intolerant' truth by its very nature –, but precisely also in the teaching office of the Church to which the Pope lays claim."

» to the homepage (external link, Süddeutsche Zeitung)
More from the press review on the subject » Religion, » Science / Research, » Weltanschauung, » Italy
All available articles from » Johan Schloemann

» To the complete press review of Friday, January 18, 2008