Whew

Even Cardinal Ratzinger missed a deadline...once.

The next time I was in Rome I was granted an audience with Cardinal Ratzinger. In the course of our conversation I told him of the request from my friend to write a foreword to Guardini's The Lord. Much to my surprise, he said he would be pleased to do so. Not to my surprise, I never received anything.


ABOUT EIGHT MONTHS LATER I found myself in Rome again and was once more granted an audience. I read a book I had with me as I waited for the meeting with the Cardinal, being moved from one richly appointed ante-chamber to the next in the 16th century palazzo housing the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. As I was finally ushered into the Cardinal's presence, he put his hands in the air and greeted me with: "Ach, Herr Professor Haas, ich hab' solch' ein schlechtes Gewissen!" "Oh, Professor Haas, I have such a guilty conscience."

Comments

[Ambrose]

Well, he has even joked recently that his time in Rome has made him a little less German.

[Frank McManus]

I've loved Guardini's The Lord for many years, but I have to admit that I was irked when Regnery re-issued the book (with Cardinal Ratzinger's foreword), but did not fix the old edition's many typos -- which I believe go all the way back to the first English hardcover edition. Some of the biblical references, for example, are unintelligible.

Please forgive me if I've marred this delightful story about Cardinal Ratinger by my griping.