VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
January 14, 2020
By Joshua J. McElwee
Retired Pope Benedict XVI’s name is being removed as a coauthor of a controversial new book defending the Catholic Church’s practice of clerical celibacy after dueling accounts emerged of the ex-pontiff’s involvement in the preparation of the volume.
The removal, confirmed in a tweet Jan. 14 by Cardinal Robert Sarah, the other author of the book, comes after an odd and dramatic public dispute between Sarah and Archbishop Georg Gänswein, Benedict’s private secretary.
In fact, announcement of the change in authorship came only 90 minutes after Sarah had tweeted a statement defending the choice to list Benedict as a coauthor, claiming the former pope had reviewed the entire manuscript of the volume, the cover design, and also consulted on the publication date.
Sarah, who leads the Vatican’s liturgy office, even quoted a Nov. 25 conversation with Benedict, in which the cardinal said the ex-pontiff had told him: “I agree that the text be published in the form you have foreseen.”
Within an hour, Gänswein had told Italian and German-language news agencies that Benedict only thought he was preparing an essay for the volume, and did not intend to be listed as a coauthor.
“He never approved any project for a coauthored book, and never saw nor authorized the cover,” the archbishop told Italy’s Ansa agency.
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