Forgetfulness of God

He faithfully served three Popes. Now, Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes has gone to heaven, nearly ninety years old (1934-2024). John Paul II had called him to Rome from his Germany, entrusting him with curial tasks: youth, new ecclesial movements, charity. On these frontiers, the bishop and then cardinal Cordes worked generously and tirelessly, working alongside John Paul, Benedict, and Francis.

He organized the World Youth Days, from the very first one, with three hundred thousand young people in St. Peter's Square on Palm Sunday, April 15, 1984. At the outbreak of the new movements, many bishops reacted negatively (and prominent bishops: Martini, Cè, Lorscheider among others). They feared dualisms, parallel pastorates, role overlaps. John Paul II supported the new charisms, entrusting Cordes to accompany, guide, enlighten, instruct, and promote their testimony. And, at the same time, to help dioceses welcome and accept them as new experiences of the Church. Mission accomplished.
He coordinated the charitable activities of the Holy See, as President of Cor Unum. With a guiding idea always reaffirmed: to combat the “forgetfulness of God”. Subsequently, he was also at the origin of Benedict XVI's first encyclical Deus caritas est, in 2006.

“A man of definitive decision – Pope Ratzinger would describe him – who does not seek popularity,” because “his measure is not the applause of many, but the faith of the Church,” responding with “clarity in the fight against majority opinions.”

About himself, Cordes writes in his testament of having realized “how much the first part of the great divine commandment, the love of God, had lost its importance, both in organized charity acts and in being a Christian itself.” He maintains that if today it is necessary to promote peace, justice, integrity of creation, “however, I was certain that these objectives could never overshadow or perhaps replace the typical and specific nature of the Church's mission.” God above all. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel.
Monsignor Ganswein, former secretary of Benedict, remembers Cordes “above all as a man who loved the Church and who committed himself to the Gospel opportune et importune. He spent his strength for Christ and the preaching of the word of God.” The blue eyes of Paul Josef Cordes now gaze upon God. His definitive decision.
 

Renzo Agasso
NP April 2024