From the Concepcionistas Misioneras de la Enseñanza Congregation we want to convey our condolences on the death of Benedict XVI: a Pope who loved the Church and who endowed it with special strength with his writings and his knowledge. He put his great wisdom and intelligence at the service of Theology to give it much more consistency and theological value and offered us with his writings a song to truth and love ("Deus caritas est" y "Caritas in veritate") .

We pray for his eternal rest and we thank God for his person.

January 26, 2022

Here we can see an image of his Apostolic Blessing on the occasion of the canonization of Santa Carmen Sallés in 2012

Éste es el 'Testamento Espiritual' de Benedicto XVI: "¡Manteneos firmes en la fe! No se confundan"

On August 19, 2006, one year after being elected Pope, Benedict XVI wrote his 'spiritual testament'. For his interest, we offer it in its entirety below

"Es en el diálogo con las ciencias naturales como también la fe ha aprendido a comprender mejor el límite del alcance de sus pretensiones, y por tanto su especificidad"

"He visto y veo cómo de la maraña de hipótesis ha surgido y vuelve a surgir lo razonable de la fe. Jesucristo es verdaderamente el camino, la verdad y la vida, y la Iglesia, con todas sus insuficiencias, es verdaderamente su cuerpo"

"Doy gracias a mis padres, que me dieron la vida en una época difícil y que, a costa de grandes sacrificios, con su amor prepararon para mí una morada magnífica que, como una luz clara, ilumina todos mis días hasta el día de hoy"

"Doy las gracias al pueblo de mi patria porque en él he experimentado una y otra vez la belleza de la fe. Rezo para que nuestra tierra siga siendo una tierra de fe y os lo ruego, queridos compatriotas: no os dejéis apartar de la fe"

"Doy gracias a Dios por toda la belleza que he podido experimentar en todas las etapas de mi viaje, pero especialmente en Roma y en Italia, que se ha convertido en mi segunda patria"

31.12.2022 | Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI

Dated August 19, 2006

If, at this late hour of my life, I look back over the decades that I have traveled, I see first of all How many reasons do I have to give thanks? First, I thank God myself, giver of all good, who gave me life and guided me in various moments of confusion; he always picked me up when i started to slip and always brought me back the light of his countenance. In retrospect I see and understand that even the dark and tiring sections of this road were for my salvation and that it was in them that He guided me well.

I thank my parents, who gave me life in a difficult time and who, at the cost of great sacrifices, with their love prepared for me a magnificent home that, like a clear light, illuminates all my days to this day. My father's lucid faith taught us children to believe, and as a sign it has always stood firm amid all my scientific achievements; my mother's deep devotion and great kindness are a legacy for which I can never thank her enough. My sister has assisted me for decades selflessly and with affectionate care; my brother, with the lucidity of his judgments, his vigorous resolution and the serenity of his heart, has always paved the way for me; without this constant preceding and accompanying me, he would not have been able to find the right path.

From my heart I thank God for the many friends, men and women, that he has always placed by my side.; for the collaborators in all the stages of my journey; for the teachers and students who have given me. With gratitude I commend them all to his goodness. And I want to thank the Lord for my beautiful homeland in the Bavarian Prealps, where I have always seen the splendor of the Creator himself shine. I thank the people of my homeland because in it I have experienced the beauty of faith time and time again. I pray that our land continues to be a land of faith and I beg you, dear compatriots: do not let yourself be separated from the faith. And finally, I thank God for all the beauty that I have been able to experience at all stages of my journey, but especially in Rome and in Italy, which has become my second homeland.

To all those whom I have harmed in any way, I sincerely apologize.

What I said to my compatriots before, I now say to all those in the Church who are entrusted to my service: stand firm in the faith! Do not confuse. It often gives the impression that science - the natural sciences on the one hand, and historical research (especially the exegesis of Holy Scripture) on the other - is capable of offering irrefutable results in contradiction to the Catholic faith.

I have been following the path of Theology for sixty years, particularly the Biblical sciences, and with the succession of different generations I have seen theses that seemed immovable collapse, proving to be mere hypotheses: the liberal generation (Harnack, Jülicher, etc. ), the existentialist generation (Bultmann, etc.), the Marxist generation

I have lived through the transformations of the natural sciences for a long time, and I have been able to verify how, on the contrary, the apparent certainties against faith have vanished, proving to be not science, but only philosophical interpretations apparently belonging to science; in the same way that, on the other hand, it is in dialogue with the natural sciences that faith has also learned to better understand the limit of the scope of its claims, and therefore its specificity.

I have seen and see how the reasonableness of faith has emerged from the tangle of hypotheses and re-emerges. Jesus Christ is truly the way, the truth, and the life, and the Church, with all her insufficiencies, is truly his body.

For sixty years now I have been accompanying the path of Theology, particularly the Biblical sciences., and with the succession of different generations I have seen theses that seemed immovable collapse, proving to be mere hypotheses: the liberal generation (Harnack, Jülicher, etc.), the existentialist generation (Bultmann, etc.), the Marxist generation. I have seen and see how the reasonableness of faith has emerged from the tangle of hypotheses and re-emerges. Jesus Christ is truly the way, the truth and the life, and the Church, with all its insufficiencies, is truly his body.

Finally, I humbly request: Pray for me, so that the Lord, despite all my sins and insufficiencies, receives me in eternal dwellings. To all who have been entrusted to me, my prayers come from my heart, day by day.

Benedict XVI