Cardinal Rouco Varela says the 'yes to God' is the Spanish Church's main challenge

The Spanish Bishops' Conference (CEE), Spain's counterpart of the USCCB, has launched a series of interviews with its most recent presidents to mark 60 years since its founding.

The first video podcast, available on YouTube, features Cardinal Rouco Varela, archbishop emeritus of Madrid, who led the conference from 1999 to 2002, from 2002 to 2005, and again from 2008 to 2011 and from 2011 to 2014. In the conversation he reviewed six decades of the conference's history and the main challenges facing the Church in Spain today.

Saying yes to God as the central challenge

Reflecting on the Church's current challenges, the cardinal placed first "The yes of faith. The yes to God," and said it concerns not only Spain but all of Europe. "All the others depend on whether that challenge is taken up well or not," he said. Rouco recalled that the late Pope Benedict XVI voiced the same concern: "God and the yes to God."

The issues that marked his presidency

The cardinal recalled the matters that dominated his two periods at the head of the conference: terrorism by ETA, the Basque separatist group, the defense of life, marriage and the family, education, and the presence of Catholics in public life. On terrorism, he pointed to the document "Valoración moral del terrorismo, de sus causas y de sus consecuencias" (Moral Assessment of Terrorism, Its Causes and Its Consequences), published by the conference in November 2002.

Rouco also stressed the importance of defending the dignity of the person and of encouraging Catholics to take part in society, without the Church identifying itself with any political party. "The mission of the Church is to affirm and defend the transcendence and the dignity of the human person and of the fundamental goods bound up with it," he said.

World Meeting of Families and World Youth Day

The cardinal spoke about the significance of the World Meeting of Families held in Valencia in 2006 with Benedict XVI, and of World Youth Day in Madrid in 2011, which drew hundreds of thousands of young people. On that night, 1,553,000 cell phones were connected to the network at the Cuatro Vientos airfield, with registrations topping 1.8 million.

Lessons and a view of the future

Looking back on his time in office, Rouco Varela named two lessons: "the need for great humility and for trust in providence, together with the importance of collaboration and communion." The president of the conference, he said, is not "the boss of the bishops" but acts as a representative within that collegial body.

For the present and the future, the cardinal called for moving from dreams to realities, with hope and commitment. He listed the public good, the social good, social justice and a life of charity among the challenges, and dwelt on one in particular: "The first fact of solidarity is giving life. A people, a society that has no children is dying."

Coming episodes

The video podcasts, made by the conference and produced by Ábside Media Producciones, will be posted on YouTube every Wednesday. The next is due October 28 with Cardinal Blázquez, followed by Cardinal Omella on November 4 and Archbishop Argüello on November 10. The series will be accompanied by a documentary titled "60 años de la CEE: una historia compartida" (60 Years of the CEE: A Shared History), set for release around the Spanish bishops' next plenary assembly, scheduled for November 16 to 23.