Vatican City, Oct 9, 2005 / 22:00 pm
On Sunday, before leading the weekly Angelus prayer, Pope Benedict visited the relics of the newly blessed Servant of God, Cardinal Clemens August von Galen, the late bishop of Münster, Germany who, the Pope said, was given the gift, through faith, to see clearly when much of the German intelligentsia went blind to the horrors of the Nazi regime.
Speaking off the cuff about the Cardinal, the Holy Father said that, "All people, especially we Germans, are thankful because the Lord gave us this great witness of faith who brought the light of truth to shine in times of darkness, and showed the courage to oppose the power of tyranny."
"But we must also ask ourselves where did he get such intuition from, at a time when intelligent people seemed blind? And where did get the strength to oppose, at a time when even the strong showed themselves to be weak and vile?"
The late Cardinal, who fought against the Nazi's during the second World War "drew intuition and courage from the faith," the Pope said, something "which showed him the truth and opened his heart and his eyes."