Bishop Skylstad calls new encyclical ‘profound’

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Bishop William S. Skylstad of Spokane, Wash., president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Pope Benedict XVI’s first encyclical shows "his great scholarship and his profound spiritual insight."

He highlighted the pope’s emphasis on the church’s "service of charity" and his nuanced treatment of Catholic social teaching.

The encyclical, titled "Deus Caritas Est" ("God Is Love"), was released Jan. 25.

The papal letter is "a profound meditation on the meaning of Christian love and the place of charity in the life of the church," Bishop Skylstad said in a statement released by the USCCB in Washington.

"I would single out in particular the Holy Father’s affirmation that ‘the church cannot neglect the service of charity any more than she can neglect the sacraments and the word,’" he said. "This affirmation puts this service at the very center of the church’s life, and it follows a reflection in depth on the meaning of love as it appears in sacred Scripture."

The USCCB president noted that the pope "also discusses the relationship between charity and justice. He reviews the social teaching of the church" and the responsibility of politics to create a just social order.

"At the same time," Bishop Skylstad said, "faith and politics — each independent in its own sphere — meet on the question ‘what is justice?’ because ‘faith liberates reason from its blind spots’ and thus helps politics to achieve a just society. ... Thus, while not replacing the state in the task of bringing about a just society, at the same time, the church ‘cannot and must not remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice.’"

Cardinal Adam J. Maida of Detroit said that while "‘love’ is one of the most overused words in our culture today," the new encyclical "helps us to retrieve the full meaning and dignity of love — not just as a word but as a way of living."

"He reminds us that natural human love between a man and a woman is a beautiful and sacred thing but it needs discipline and maturity lest it lose its true dignity and purpose," the cardinal added.

One of the distinctive elements of the new encyclical is its in-depth discussion of the differences and the relationship between what the Greeks called "eros," or erotic love, and what they termed "agape," or selfless love.

Philosophy professor Christopher Kaczor of Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, who teaches on the philosophy of love and marriage, said the pope "distinguishes erotic love from self-giving love to reunite the two again together for the greater flourishing of humanity, both spiritually and materially."

"Pope Benedict is convinced that the biblical revelation concerning love is that nothing good and authentic in human love is lost when this love is combined with God’s love," Kaczor said. "Rather, human love discovers its depth and full importance precisely when elevated by God’s own self-giving love."

The encyclical draws its title from its opening sentence, a quotation from the First Letter of John: "God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him."

Quoting that thematic opening, Bishop Paul S. Loverde of Arlington, Va., said the encyclical "examines the relationship between different forms of love — specifically the transformation from ‘eros’ between man and woman to ‘agape’ as a gift of charity and love for others."

"The purity of the Christian heart and power of God’s love must serve as the foundation for all that we do," the Arlington bishop said.

Bishop William E. Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., said, "Pope Benedict helps us see how, when we encounter God’s love, most especially in the Eucharist, what we believe is connected with how we worship; and what we believe and how we worship are interconnected with morality, with how we live."

Looking at the second part of the document, which focuses on charity in the life of the church and its members, Bishop Lori said, "The Holy Father reminds us that organized charity was considered an essential part of the church’s life from the very beginning — not an optional activity or an add-on. ... In my view, Pope Benedict provides us with a magnificent description of the foundations for Catholic charitable activity (and) for Catholic advocacy whether at the level of the parish, the diocese or the universal church."

Father Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA, found it noteworthy that the release of the encyclical coincided with "an International Conference on Charity sponsored by the Pontifical Council Cor Unum at which some 200 leaders of Catholic charitable organizations around the world gathered."