"The 10:30 Mass at St. Peter's this morning was Mozart's Coronation Mass - Cardinal Christoph Schonborn celebrated. I thought I read somewhere that the Pope would deliver a short address at the end of Mass, but I'm not sure if that happened or not."

Labels: Cardinal Schonborn, Christopher Schonborn

"The debate is unlikely to take on much steam under the current reign, though supporters of loosening the celibacy vows say that Benedict officially addressing the issue helps keep it alive for the future. One Vatican source told TIME that a surprising sign of support for the progressives on this issue may be coming from one of Benedict's most loyal deputies and a noted traditionalist, Vienna's Cardinal Cristoph Schonborn. Austria, coincidentally or not, is one of the countries most sorely in need of priests. So while the latest Milingo chapter may be over, there may be more plot twists to come." (Italics added) [Read the entire article.]

Labels: Cardinal Schonborn, Christopher Schonborn

ROME, August 21, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Jesuit priest-astronomer who vocally opposed the Catholic understanding of God-directed creation, has been removed from his post as head of the Vatican observatory.

Fr. George Coyne has been head of the Vatican observatory for 25 years is an expert in astrophysics with an interest in the interstellar medium, stars with extended atmospheres and Seyfert galaxies. He also appointed himself as an expert in evolutionary biology and theology last summer in an article for the UK's liberal Catholic magazine, The Tablet.

Fr. Coyne was writing against Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, a principal author of the Catholic catechism, who said that an "unplanned process of random variation and natural selection," both important parts of evolutionary thinking, are incompatible with Catholic belief in God's ordering and guiding of creation.

Coyne, retiring after 25 years of service for the Vatican observatory, said, "The classical question as to whether the human being came about by chance, and so has no need of God, or by necessity, and so through the action of a designer God, is no longer valid."

Schonborn had written in the New York Times that "neo-Darwinian evolution is not compatible with Catholic doctrine."

Fr. Coyne is being replaced at the Vatican Observatory by Father Funes, 43, a native of Cordoba, Argentina.

[More from LifeSiteNews.]

Vatican City, Aug. 21--Pope Benedict XVI has appointed a new director of the Vatican Observatory, replacing the Rev. George Coyne, a long-serving Jesuit astronomer and a vocal opponent of "intelligent design" theory.

It was unclear if the replacement of Coyne, the observatory's director since 1978, reflected a sense of disapproval within the Vatican over his opposition to intelligent design -- the idea that the world is too complex to have been created by natural events alone.

Coyne has frequently attacked the theory as a "religious movement" lacking scientific merit. He could not be reached for comment.

There was no mention of Coyne in a brief statement released by the Vatican on Saturday (Aug. 19) announcing the appointment of the new director, the Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, who is also a Jesuit.

The Argentine-born Funes, 43, holds a doctorate in astronomy from the University of Padua in Italy. He also studied theology at the Jesuit-run Gregorian University in Rome.

In his new post, he will oversee the Vatican Astronomical Observatory, founded by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582, and the observatory's modern research center in Mount Graham, Ariz.

In his staunch defense of evolution, Coyne, 73, has frequently crossed swords with Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, a former protégé and close adviser to Benedict whose support of intelligent design has been instrumental in introducing the theory into Catholic discourse.

The clash opened a divide between Vatican scientists who support Charles Darwin's theory and prominent theologians who believe evolution has been exaggerated to mount ideological attacks to disprove the existence of a creator-God.

Although Benedict has referred to the "cosmos" as an "intelligent project," he has yet to explicitly weigh in on the merits of intelligent design, a question that has generated an explosive debate in the United States.

In a November interview, Coyne suggested the pope should withhold judgment on the issue, adding that Benedict "doesn't have the slightest idea of what intelligent design means in the U.S."

In early September, Benedict will conduct a weekend seminar on the impact Darwin's theory has on the church's teaching of Creation. Schonborn, who has described evolution as "incompatible" with church teachings, will speak at the event, along with evolution advocate Peter Schuster, president of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Other speakers at the event include the Rev. Paul Erbrich, emeritus professor of natural philosophy from the University of Munich, who has described evolution as a "fundamentally inadequate" explanation of the origins of life; and Robert Spaemann, a conservative German philosopher who has challenged "evolutionism," or the philosophical applications of Darwin's theory.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) - Around 300,000 people from around the world are expected to turn up for a meeting between Benedict XVI and ecclesial movements, set to take place in St Peter's Square on the vigil of Pentecost. This was announced this morning by Mgr Josef Clemens, secretary of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, as he presenting the second world congress of ecclesial movements and of new communities in the Vatican. The congress will take place in Rocca di Papa from 31 May to 2 June 2006, and the encounter of the pope will follow.

The congress, organised by the Pontifical Council for the Laity, will have the theme: "The beauty of being a Christian and the joy of communicating this", inspired by the homily preached by Benedict XVI at the mass launching his pontificate. The three main talks will be entrusted to the Cardinals Christoph Schonborn, O.P., Marc Ouellet, P.S.S. and Angelo Scola: they will tackle Christological (Christ, "the most beautiful of Adam's sons"), church ("The beauty of being Christians") and pastoral ("Church movements and new communities in the mission of the Church: priorities and prospects") issues. [More...]

"During a conversation in Cracow last July, Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, O.P., the archbishop of Vienna, proposed that he and I organize a conference to discuss the growing gap between America and Europe, the roots of that gap as analyzed in my book The Cube and the Cathedral, and the possibilities of strengthening the trans-Atlantic Catholic dialogue and the new evangelization on both continents. I readily agreed, and the conference, which included some fifty public intellectuals from "Old Europe," "New Europe," and the United States, met in April in the archbishop's palace in Vienna. Many of us were housed in a former barracks of the Teutonic Knights; to have come from Poland, where I had been visiting, to the barracks of the Teutonic Knights was ... historically interesting, to say the least. (Why? Google "Battle of Grunwald, 1410"). But the Deutschordenshaus is a story for another day."

"Cardinal Schoenborn, who makes great sense in a half-dozen languages, provided the intellectual glue that held an international, interdisciplinary conversation together; as an American present, Dr. William Hurlbut of Stanford, put it, "Coming from California, it's refreshing and amazing to hear words of truth and light in the accents of Arnold Schwarzenegger." [More...]

May. 02 (CWNews.com) - Only by building on its rich spiritual patrimony can Europe flourish in the future. That was the message Pope Benedict XVI sent to a conference jointly organized by the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow, being held in Vienna this week.

The Pope's message, conveyed by Cardinal Paul Poupard, welcomed the effort to cooperate in "courageous and renewed evangelical action in the Europe of the 3rd millennium." The Pope said that respect for different spiritual traditions has enriched Europe, encouraging the tradition of respect for human rights that has removed "grave obstacles to the integral development of nations."

The papal message thanked the Moscow patriarchate for the "encouraging cooperation" that had led to this week's meeting. The Pontiff also thanked Vienna's Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn for hosting the event.

Moscow, April 20, Interfax - An international conference called "European Meeting of Christian Culture" on the theme Give a Soul to Europe - the Mission and the Responsibility of the Churches will be held from May 3 to 5 in Vienna, Austria.

It is organized by the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate. The logistics is undertaken by Pro Oriente, a Catholic organization, Interfax was told Thursday in DECR.

The aim of the conference is to review the challenges facing Christian Churches today, such as the globalization and the spreading of sects and new forms of unbelief and religious indifference. On the other hand, the participants plan to offer their own vision of coming out of the crisis through education of the younger generation on the basis of Christian values and through efforts to increase the influence of Christian ethics on politics, economy and the mass media.

The meeting is called also to assess the resources of inter-Christian cooperation in restoring Christian ethical foundations in European society and the advantages of dialogue between Christian Churches and other religions and representatives of secular humanism.

Among Russian participants in the conference are Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, chairman of the DECR, Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, Archpriest Vladimir Vorobyev, rector of St. Tikhon's Humanitarian University, Hegumen Philaret Bulekov, representative of the Russian Orthodox Church in Strasbourg, Sergey Khoruzhiy, Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, and others.

The European side will be represented mostly by members of the Pontifical Council for Culture led by its president, Cardinal Paul Poupard, as well as Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, Archbishop of Vienna, Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Mr. Michel Camdessus, former general secretary of the International Monetary Fund, representatives of Catholic communities, public organizations and educational institutions.