Vatican City, Feb 7, 2012 / 08:10 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Catholic Church must demonstrate the power of love and show the limitations of an individualistic worldview, Pope Benedict XVI taught in a Lenten message released two weeks before Ash Wednesday.

In the letter released Feb. 7, the Pope contrasted an ethic of “custody' of others,” with “a mentality that, by reducing life exclusively to its earthly dimension … accepts any moral choice in the name of personal freedom.”

A society with this mindset, he warned, “can become blind to physical sufferings and to the spiritual and moral demands of life. This must not be the case in the Christian community!”

The Pope's message for Lent of 2012, which begins Feb. 22, drew from the New Testament's Letter to the Hebrews – particularly the verse that proclaims, “Let us be concerned for each other, to stir a response in love and good works.”

“All too often, however, our attitude is just the opposite,” Pope Benedict observed, describing “an indifference and disinterest born of selfishness and masked as a respect for 'privacy.'”

“Today too, the Lord’s voice summons all of us to be concerned for one another. Even today God asks us to be 'guardians' of our brothers and sisters, to establish relationships based on mutual consideration and attentiveness to the well-being, the integral well-being of others.”

He encouraged believers “to recognize in others a true 'alter ego,' infinitely loved by the Lord.”

“If we cultivate this way of seeing others as our brothers and sisters, solidarity, justice, mercy and compassion will naturally well up in our hearts.”

But when this love and care for others diminishes, social and global problems correspondingly increase.

The Pope cited the words of his predecessor, the Servant of God Paul VI, who declared that the world was “sorely ill” – with a sickness caused not by material factors, but by selfishness and “the weakening of brotherly ties between individuals and nations.”

“Contemporary culture seems to have lost the sense of good and evil,” Pope Benedict said, as he warned about the danger of “a sort of 'spiritual anesthesia' which numbs us to the suffering of others.”

“What hinders this humane and loving gaze towards our brothers and sisters?” he asked.

“Often it is the possession of material riches and a sense of sufficiency, but it can also be the tendency to put our own interests and problems above all else.”

“We should never be incapable of showing mercy towards those who suffer. Our hearts should never be so wrapped up in our affairs and problems that they fail to hear the cry of the poor.”

Yet even when the world's love grows cold, goodness “does exist and will prevail – because God is 'generous and acts generously',” through those who work on behalf of “life, brotherhood, and communion.”

“In a world which demands of Christians a renewed witness of love and fidelity to the Lord, may all of us feel the urgent need to anticipate one another in charity, service and good works,” the Pope stated, as he called all believers to practice the traditional Lenten disciplines of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

“This is a favorable time to renew our journey of faith, both as individuals and as a community, with the help of the word of God and the sacraments. This journey is one marked by prayer and sharing, silence and fasting, in anticipation of the joy of Easter.”

All of these ancient practices are meant to help the faithful grow in charity – which Pope Benedict described as “the very heart of Christian life.”

Rome, Italy, Feb 7, 2012 / 06:20 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- One of the Catholic Church’s leading experts on clerical abuse says he welcomes a significant drop in the number of cases being reported in the United States – but won’t rest until that figure reaches zero.

“The instance of new allegations have dropped precipitously, it’s a marked drop, which is great news, although we’re not going to stop till we've stopped it completely,” Monsignor Steve Rossetti, associate professor at the Catholic University of America, told CNA Feb 7.

Monsignor Rossetti was in Rome to address an international symposium on the issue of clerical abuse at the Jesuit-run Gregorian University. The Feb. 6 - 9 gathering has brought together representatives from over 140 bishops’ conferences and 30 religious orders worldwide.

Monsignor Rossetti said that recent research suggests two reasons for the sharp drop in reported cases in the U.S. First, “society has now mandatory reporting and prison sentences,” he explained, and second,“the Church has a much stronger prevention program.”

Such prevention programs, he emphasized, “do work.” By changing “the culture in which people live,” he added, “molesters realize they no longer have any safe haven in the Church or in society,” and if and when abuse does occur, “we respond much more quickly.” 

Monsignor Rossetti, a priest of the Diocese of Syracuse, New York and licensed psychologist, served as a psychological consultant to the U.S. Bishops’ Conference in drafting the 2002 Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. He is currently a consultant to the USCCB ad hoc committee on revising that Charter.

He addressed delegates today on the topic of “Ministering to Offenders: Learning from Our Past Mistakes.”

“I was really trying to share with the bishops around the world many of the mistakes that had been made in responding to allegations with child sexual abuse, and so that they wouldn’t make the same mistakes,” he said.

His primary message was that the most important thing a bishop can do is to listen to victims as in doing so “you understand the pain caused, the need to reach out to the victims, to listen to their stories, and to bring some healing from the Church.”

Monsignor Rossetti also explained to CNA that the vast majority of cases of clerical abuse actually took place in the 1970’s. His research provides two main reasons for the spike in criminal behavior at that time.  

First, “the Church took in a cohort of men who had greater amounts of sexual deviancy for some reason, not sure why, but in that time frame, there were a number of men who had more, frankly, more sexual problems.”

He also added that statistically the 1960’s and 1970’s was a “more permissive environment,” when “crimes of all sorts, not just child abuse, spiked up during that time frame.”

“So, when you have a permissive environment, and in that permissive environment you place a group of men with deviant sexual interests, you end up with an explosion,” he concluded.

The Vatican has now given bishops conferences and religious congregations until May 2012 to submit their guidelines for dealing with clerical abuse to the Vatican for approval or revision. Many are looking towards the U.S. model as a template.

“My understanding is that the Bishops’ Conference in the U.S. has been helping anyone who comes and asks for help,” said Monsignor Rossetti, “not only other countries or bishops, but also other secular programs.”

He has seen religious and non-religious groups approach the U.S. bishops of the and say “we have heard about your guidelines, we want to learn from them and implement them in our organization.”

Richard was the father of Saints Willibald, Winnebald, and Walburga. He was on a pilgrimage to Rome from his native Wessex, England, with his two sons when he was stricken and died at Lucca, Italy. Miracles were reported at his tomb and he became greatly venerated by the citizens of Lucca, who embellished accounts of his life by calling him "king of the English".

1 Then all the ancients of Israel with the princes of the tribes, and the heads of the families of the children of Israel were assembled to king Solomon in Jerusalem: that they might carry the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, that is, out of Sion.2 And all Israel assembled themselves to king Solomon on the festival day in the month of Ethanim, the same is the seventh month.3 And all the ancients of Israel came, and the priests took up the ark,4 And carried the ark of the Lord, and the tabernacle of the covenant, and all the vessels of the sanctuary, that were in the tabernacle: and the priests and the Levites carried them.5 And king Solomon, and all the multitude of Israel, that were assembled unto him went with him before the ark, and they sacrificed sheep and oxen that could not be counted or numbered.6 And the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord into its place, into the oracle of the temple, into the holy of holies under the wings of the cherubims.7 For the cherubims spread forth their wings over the place of the ark, and covered the art, and the staves thereof above.9 Now in the ark there was nothing else but the two tables of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.10 And it came to pass, when the priests were come out of the sanctuary, that a cloud filled the house of the Lord,11 And the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud: for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of the Lord.12 Then Solomon said: The Lord said that he would dwell in a cloud.13 Building I have built a house for thy dwelling, to be thy most firm throne for ever.