Dhen the longtime secretary of the Pope announced a book immediately after his death, which already puts the secretary in the spotlight in the subtitle (“My life with Benedict XVI.”), caused irritation not only in the Vatican at the beginning of January. The secretary of all people! Isn’t the papal secretary responsible for discretion, even after the death of his employer? The impression, fueled by the Italian publisher, was at best unfavorable: Was a distribution chain to be created just in time, so the question was asked, at the beginning of which stands the Ratzinger Pope and at the end of which stands his secretary Georg Gänswein?
“Nothing but the truth” is the main title of the German edition published today. He might sound “a bit boastful”, but he was “serious”, said Gänswein at the book launch last night in Munich. Set free of irony, the title claims super-enlightenment (e.g. about the circumstances surrounding Benedict’s resignation or about Ratzinger’s relationship with Francis). Taken by itself, it promises statements about how it actually was, on this side of the hermeneutics of know-it-alls who are always ready to jump. This speaks of a source-critical naivety, which places one’s own perception of delicate processes of the pontificate as absolute. A psychological self-confidence that, not coincidentally, “My life”, that of the secretary, wants to make visible in the papal prism.
The breakdown with Francis
Going uninhibitedly into detail, Gänswein tells the story of his breakdown with Pope Francis. The main point is that Gänswein, as prefect of the papal house, gradually saw his duties reduced. In this prefect function, Francis humiliated him and finally released him. It reads like this: “I remember, for example, a visit to the Community of Sant’Egidio in Trastevere on June 15, 2014: when we said goodbye the day before after the audiences in Santa Marta, the Pope told me in the presence of the Commanders of the Gendarmerie and the Swiss Guards and the chauffeurs that my presence was not necessary and that I could take a day off, and when I reacted with some surprise, he reiterated it.”
Even the chauffeurs noticed! He later explained to Francis, “that something like this reduces my authority and that I felt humiliated: he had told me his decision in the presence of others, so that gossip could circulate with different interpretations in the Vatican.”
Something like this happens: that a boss (however fair or unfair) can no longer see an employee’s nose, also ensures that the employee has less to report, receives a different official apartment than the desired one (here, too, complains Gänswein bitter), and such humiliations in turn give rise to rumors, especially in a gossip establishment like the Vatican. But is that a reason to spread yourself so personally on Ratzinger’s stage?
him or me This role problem peeps out of almost every instructive page. If, as is to be expected, “Nothing but the Truth” should become a world bestseller, then not only because of, but also in spite of its author.