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CNS/Catholic Press Photo:Archbishop Gianfranco RavasiDespite criticisms from some in the Roman curia that he is a syncretist and a dangerous progressive, Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi was handpicked by Pope Benedict XVI as the Vatican’s unofficial minister for culture. As president of the pontifical Council for Culture, he is tasked with encouraging cultural development at the grass roots and fostering high-level debate about faith and reason among scientists, historians, philosophers and other intellectuals.
It’s an important post in this papacy, given Pope Benedict’s emphasis on culture and the necessity he sees for Christians to play a countercultural role in dialogue with a largely secular society.
Since last September, Archbishop Ravasi, 65, has headed not only the Council for Culture but also the pontifical Commissions for the Church’s Cultural Heritage and for Sacred (meaning Christian) Archaeology, a trio of functions never previously exercised by one person. He is thought to figure on almost every short list ofpapabile, candidates to become pope.
A consummate communicator, Archbishop Ravasi has written, always by longhand, 150 books as well as countless articles and is an accomplished television and radio performer. Usually, his subject is the Bible, but he has also commented both on current affairs and cultural issues for several Italian dailies. His range and clarity are exceptional. He links the Bible with figures such as the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky, with Hindu holy books, with the controversial Jesuit paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, with the Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran, with the modern folk singer Fabrizio D’Andrea.
How does he manage to be so productive? Interviewed in the Council for Culture office, on Via della Concilizione leading to St. Peter’s, he provided clues. For one thing, the balding archbishop has the expressiveness and flexibility of an actor but is not carried away by his performance. For another, he says he needs only five hours sleep a day, which leaves time for his own writing and reading. On an average day he receives five books for reviews that appear in the Sunday cultural supplement of Italy’s major financial daily,Il Sole 24 Ore.
“My search has always been for something permanent, for what is behind the transitory, the contingent,” said Archbishop Ravasi. “I’m fighting loss and death, which probably relates to the absence of my father in my first years.”
Gianfranco Ravasi was the first of three children of a Lombard family disrupted by World War II. His anti-Fascist father was a tax official whose hobby and second source of income was making woodcuts used to produce posters. Sent to Sicily in the army that was to bear the brunt of the Allied invasion, he deserted but, evading Fascist and German patrols, it took him 18 months to walk to his home north of Milan. He narrowly avoided capture by German troops within a few miles of home.
Little Gianfranco did not recognize the newcomer and initially did not want him. He thinks his father’s absence influenced his development but later developed a close relationship with his father, who died last year.
His first strong memory is of standing at dusk on a hill in the countryside watching a train passing through a valley and hearing it whistle.
“It was a melancholy scene. It seemed to signify for things that fade, are transitory, contingent, and I longed for something beyond appearances, something that lasts. I’d say I’m motivated not by Mediterranean optimism but Northern pessimism.”
The statement seems in contrast with his energy and communicativeness.
“I was very close to my schoolteacher mother. She was in love with literature as I am, but not practical,” he said. “My two sisters are the practical ones. They can do or make everything, whereas I’m a nullity in that respect.” It may explain why Archbishop Ravasi has neither a computer nor a cell phone.
“I was separated from my mother when I was sent from the countryside to the small town of Merate to study and lived there with an aunt. My mother died comparatively early, which was a severe blow.”
At school, Ravasi excelled in Latin and Greek. At one time he planned to be a teacher of Greek and Latin classics but instead became a priest.
“I realized that for me study and priesthood are both aspects of a pursuit of something lasting, ultimately of God. Some can be priests and separately be scholars, but for me they are part of the same search, the same questioning. I like Julien Green’s ‘As long as we’re uneasy we can be tranquil,’ ” he said, referring to the French-American writer, whose work was shaped by his Catholic faith.
Ravasi’s search led him to the Milan seminary where his teacher, Giovanni Colombo, later a cardinal, directed him toward the Bible.
“I have great empathy with Emily Dickinson. She lived in a small town, Amherst -- which I’ve visited -- which was rather like mine. She had certain fragility and, as a result, had a yearning for something religious.”
If Archbishop Ravasi is fragile, it is not physical; he is strongly built.
In the 1960s, after attending seminary in Milan, Fr. Ravasi studied theology and exegesis at the Gregorian University and Biblical Institute in Rome. Today, he said, his main biblical interest is in establishing that the real Jesus is something more than the so-called historical Jesus. “The historical Jesus is constructed according to ideas derived ultimately from positivism. It makes Jesus a prisoner of documents. But we are now aware of more resources for our understanding of Jesus.
“To give an example, we can know more about Napoleon than is recorded in documents. If Napoleon did A and later did B, we can make inferences about the relationship between the two events and the reasons for them. We can use psychological insight. Psychology, sociology, cultural anthropology and theology can aid our understanding of Jesus. Benedict XVI used this approach in his book on Jesus.”
For 15 years, the priest worked each summer as an archaeologist in Syria, Jordan, Iraq or Turkey, collaborating with renowned figures such as the American Kathleen Kenyon or the French Dominican Roland de Vaux.
Some Catholics think the Bible has disappeared behind erudite commentaries that are often conflicting. The archbishop acknowledged that while the Second Vatican Council helped Catholics rediscover the Bible, enthusiasm has flagged. The synod of bishops next October on the Bible in the mission and life of the church is an opportunity to rekindle interest, he said.
“Despite what some think, the Bible needs study, but rewards it. You cannot just open the Bible and quote a slab, making direct applications to current situations. We have to find ways which will attract people to the Bible but also guide them on how it should be read,” he said.
“For synod delegates, I’m preparing an hourlong DVD in both Italian and English, which shows how to do this. It’s not easy because you have to explain the historical context, illustrate the literary text but also draw out its message.”
How can you foster serious interest in the Bible when the public seems to prefer the kooky and weird in the religious field, with a preference for exposures of what the church has allegedly hidden?
“Appetites have become jaded because of the hunt for the ever more excessive and spectacular. Surrogates for substantial religion abound, but I think people are still seeking responses on the great themes, such as life and death, truth and falsehood, sin and evil. I’ve found there is a keen demand for material on these topics if presented in the right way,” Archbishop Ravasi said.
“Benedict XVI is aware of this need. He hammers at certain nodal points to counter superficiality and the sense that all is fluid and nothing firm. We have to rebuild from basics.”
For 18 years before his present appointment, Archbishop Ravasi was prefect of the prestigious Milanese library, the Ambrosianum, founded in 1607, which boasts 30,000 historical manuscripts including the Leonardo Da Vinci codex of 1,275 sheets (75 sheets of a different codex were sold to Bill Gates for $25 million). The archbishop established an Ambrosian Library Foundation in the United States together with the University of Notre Dame and other bodies.
What are his aims for the pontifical Council for Culture?
“One main area of concern is the dialogue between science and faith and an occasion for this will be the bicentenary of Darwin’s birth in 2009. Another major concern is relations with the new major actors on the world stage such as China and India. A third is seeking adequate responses to the challenge of the sects in Latin America; an aspect of this is the role to attribute to folk religion. We also have to pursue more effective ways to convey the Christian message; what Voltaire said about sermons is still apt. He compared them to Charlemagne’s sword -- ‘long and flat.’ ”
What does he consider the most ignored aspect of the Second Vatican Council?
“Its teaching on the church. It needs to be better understood to aid dialogue with the world, with other churches and within the church itself,” he said.
Desmond O’Grady is a novelist, playwright and journalist who lives in Rome.
National Catholic Reporter May 16, 2008
