German Catholic journalist Peter Seewald has landed the ultimate interview. His in-depth conversion with Pope Benedict XVI is the subject of the new book Light of the World: The Pope, the Church, and the Sign of the Times due out tomorrow.

Among the highlights being reported in the media:

* The Pope understands why the clergy sex abuse scandals has caused some Catholics, especially victims, to leave the Church.

From Catholic News Service: An entire chapter and parts of others were dedicated to the clerical sex abuse
scandal. The pope called it “a great crisis” that left him “stunned by how
wretched the church is, by how much her members fail to follow
Christ.”

“It was really almost like the crater of a volcano, out of which
suddenly a tremendous cloud of filth came, darkening and soiling everything, so
that above all the priesthood suddenly seemed to be a place of shame,” he
said.

He expressed optimism about the church’s recovery from the scandal,
saying God continues to raise up Catholic saints. But he also said he
understands why some Catholics, particularly victims, have responded by leaving
the church in protest.

“It is difficult for them to keep believing that
the church is a source of good, that she communicates the light of Christ, that
she helps people in life — I can understand that,” he said.

The pope
said media coverage of the abuse scandal was partly motivated by a desire to
discredit the church. But he added that the church must be “grateful for every
disclosure” and said the media could not have reported in this way “had there
not been evil in the church.”

* The Pope acknowledges that, in certain circumstances (particularly involving prostitution and curbing the spread of AIDS), the use of condoms could be seen as “a first step” in taking moral responsibility for one’s sexual behavior.

From Time.com: Benedict’s so-called condom concession was not a huge one. He still
proscribes the use of condoms as contraception (as he does the birth control
pill). His specific example, that of a male prostitute choosing to use a condom
in a conscious choice to prevent HIV infection, is couched as “a first step in
the direction of moralization, a first assumption of responsibility, on the way
toward recovering an awareness that not everything is allowed and that one
cannot do whatever one wants.” Benedict seems to imply a scale of good and bad
intentions — from the indiscriminate use of condoms and other contraceptives to
the idea of preventing the spread of AIDS to following the teachings of the
Catholic Church. Condoms are not the ultimate solution or the prescribed
Catholic way, he reiterates, though Benedict allows that there is little the
church can do to prevent anyone from acquiring condoms. Still, he insists that
“the sheer fixation on the condom implies a banalization of sexuality… the
dangerous source of the attitude of no longer seeing sexuality as the expression
of love.”

* The Pope defends Pius XII’s actions during the Holocaust, saying he “saved
more Jews than anyone else.”

From Reuters: In the book-length interview with a German journalist, the pope says
of Pius:

“The decisive thing is what he did and what he tried to do, and on that score
we really must acknowledge, I believe, that he was one of the great righteous
men and that he saved more Jews than anyone else.”

Note: While the Pope’s view offends some of the Jewish faith, it’s worth noting the campaign of Gary Krupp, the Jewish leader of the Pave the Way Foundation, who is working hard to correct what he believes to be the tragically-wrong notion that Pius was “Hitler’s Pope.”
Read Story.

* The Pope says he would resign if incapacitated.

From Reuters:  Pope Benedict says…that he would not hesitate to become the first
pontiff to resign willingly in more than 700 years if he felt himself no longer
able, “physically, psychologically and spiritually,” to lead the church.

                                                         ***

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