“And when the Church engages in a culture war, it will always lose,” he said.
Bätzing used the German term for culture war — “Kulturkampf.” Given its bitter historical context, this is a loaded concept, amid the current concerns over the German Synodal Way, including its demand for blessing homosexual unions.
The alternative to a culture war, Bätzing added, was “not adaptation, not simply agreeing to everything and going along with everything,” but “the ecclesial principle” of “discernment of spirits.”
“This is precisely what we have tried to do in the Synodal Way,” the bishop claimed.
“The spirit of the times — ‘Zeitgeist’ — is the spirit of the world. Signs of the times are signs that God gives to people through culture, through a current development [movement], so that we can better understand what the Gospel wants.”
The president of the German bishops’ conference added: “We have to differentiate.”