In the late 1960's Father Doctor Joseph Ratzinger and the heretic Father Doctor Hans Küng were the stars of the School of Catholic Theology at the University of Tübingen, each holding a chair of Dogmatic Theology in that department. But their temperamental and human differences were patent.
The impetuous Swiss traveled around in his white Alfa Romeo dressed in elegant mufti. The journalists would go to him whenever they needed a dissident Catholic opinion on the hot button issues of those post-conciliar days. The discrete Bavarian theologian on the other hand would move around on foot or by public transportation, would say daily mass in a female student dormitory and would dedicate his time to study and preparation of his lectures, keeping himself faithful to his austere and reserved lifestyle.
For those few years (1966-1969) the two men were close colleagues, going out alone for a weekly Thursday evening dinner together to discuss Faculty affairs. Ratzinger, though, was the brighter of the two and kept ever loyal to the Magisterium.
El profesor Ratzinger, Gianni Valente San Pablo: Madrid, 2011, p. 164-65 .
He was always a man of noble and exemplary industry, loyalty and simplicity, and Catholic and priestly honesty! in a world of upheavals!
N.B. 1968 was the year of the student uprisings in Europe, Tübingen included.
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