IN BRIEF

CARDINAL SECRETARY OF STATE TARCISIO BERTONE S.D.B., has written a Message, in the name of the Holy Father, to Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, marking the end of an international conference on "The University and the Social Doctrine of the Church." The conference was promoted by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace in collaboration with the Congregation for Catholic Education. In the Message, Cardinal Bertone states that "the Church's social doctrine ... by its very structure tends towards interdisciplinary dialogue, because the disciplines from which it draws include, on the one hand, theology and philosophy and, on the other, the human and social sciences. For this reason, [it] can contribute to providing a basic orientational framework for the various disciplines, bringing them to collaborate with one another in full respect for the specific nature of each. It can, then, become a bearer of sapiental knowledge with which to enrich the many activities of research and formation in Catholic universities."

HORST KOHLER, PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY, offered a concert in honor of the Holy Father on Saturday November 18. At the end of the concert - which was given by the "Philharmonia Quartett Berlin" and took place in the Clementine Hall of the Vatican Apostolic Palace - the Pope delivered a brief address. "Playing together as soloists," he said, "requires each individual not only to use all his technical and musical abilities in playing his part but, at the same time, to know how to draw back and listen attentively to the others. Only if ... each player does not put himself at the center but, in a spirit of service, becomes part of the whole, ... an 'instrument' that turns the composer's idea into sound to reach the listeners' hearts, only then does the interpretation become truly great. This is a beautiful image, also for us who, within the Church, are committed to being 'instruments' to communicate to men and women the idea of the great 'Composer,' Whose work is the harmony of the universe."
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