Some of the most moving moments in my week-long interviews with Msgr. Georg Ratzinger on which our book "My Brother, the Pope" was based, were those when he remembered how both brothers reinforced another's faith.
Keep in mind, Georg Ratzinger was the older brother, born three years before Joseph, who later became Pope. In a certain way, he became his role-model, although both brothers were different in both mentality and gifts. In Georg's case, it was his love for music which developed rather early. Joseph, on the other hand, was the little genius, the best of his class at school, a loner in the afternoons, who enjoyed nothing more than to be with his books, either in the hay of his parent's stable or out there in nature, in the green meadows of their Bavarian homeland. What united both was not only the common blood, as two sons of a very close and loving family, but, first of all, their common Catholic faith and their rural Bavarian piety, which determined the events of the year and enriched the everyday life of the Ratzingers.
Read Full Article »