Aschau, Dofstraße; to the far right, the residence of the Ratzinger family
Aschau was a long, drawn-out place, a so-called strassendorf (street-village), and our house was located more toward the far end, away from the church. It was a nice two-family house, “a real villa”, as Mother said the moment she saw it. Father’s office, which he shared with an assistant, was on the ground floor along with the latter’s apartment, while we lived in the floor above. People came to the office and filed reports, against a neighbor or whomever. There was also a telephone there, as in Tittmoning, but we were not allowed to touch it; it was strictly for business. At that point in time, we ourselves did not yet have our own telephone. The house had a beautiful bay window that we immediately liked very much. Then on the first story [above the ground floor] there was a kitchen-dining room with a stove and the table at which we ate meals. Besides that, there was a sofa or a “canape”, as people used to say then. The harmonium, too, which was delivered soon after we moved in, had its place here. On the other side was the living room, which was very nicely furnished, although in the winter it was rarely heated. Then there was a bedroom in which Father slept with us boys and a second bedroom for Mother and our sister. In a hall that connected the rooms with each other, we set up the Christmas crib immediately after we moved in. We very quickly felt at home there. A small addition to the house accommodated the holding cell. The delinquents whom Father had apprehended had to stay overnight there until he or his second-in-command brought them the next morning on foot to the jail in Mühldorf, which was ten and a half miles away. Since the policeman also had to provide board for the fellows who were arrested, Mother shared our food with them. So they had the best possible care, since she was always a very good cook.
In addition, the house had a beautiful garden, which of course gave Mother great joy. In that garden there was a little pool of water that served as a carp pond. In it my brother almost drowned once. This pond was located at the foot of a small slope, which Joseph at that time in his childish exuberance used to slide down, until he fell in the water and was in danger of perishing. Luckily my parents reacted quickly enough, grabbed him, pulled him out, and thus saved his life. The fishpond was filled in soon after that, and today no one remembers exactly where it was located. When my brother became pope, I was invited to Aschau for the unveiling of a memorial that had been set up in his honor. I spoke then with the mayor, a very friendly man, who could no longer even remember there had ever been a pond there.
The general store was located not far from the church. There were several shops in the village, but this one was the most important. It belonged to a Frau Bastl, who had several children, and one of her sons was in my grade one year. The shop had everything the heart could desire: groceries and sweets, bonbons and chocolate, pencils and penholders, paper, fabrics for aprons, and clothing for Mother and our sister, really everything. For us it was a veritable fairy-tale kingdom. At the other end of the village was the Thann hamlet. There a studious young man lived, Franz Xaver Kronberger (1913-2010), who had just earned his secondary school diploma (Abitur). I still remember how he used to wear the Abitur cap with a red velvet ribbon on which the Abitur badge was printed, the Abiturzipfel, a triangular piece of cloth that was worn on one’s pocket watch, and the white-and-red Abiturband. We were immensely impressed by that at the time. Later he studied theology and became an assistant pastor at the cathedral in Munich. We met him again then, and a good personal relationship developed.
The most important man in Aschau was of course the pastor. Our pastor, whose name was Alois Igl, had a beneficiary by the name of Georg Rinser, an uncle of the author Luise Rinser. Frau Rinser may have been somewhat eccentric, but her uncle was an awfully nice man. He was a bit handicapped, mentally as well as physically, for he had once been stung by hornets and became so seriously ill afterward that he had to go on disability. He had a housekeeper named Elis (which sounded somewhat more dignified than the usual “Lisl”), who always gave us something when we came by, for example, a nut or whatever. She simply needed to do something nice to everyone who visited her, and for that reason alone we always liked to go to her house.
Other dignitaries in Aschau were the secondary school principal and the teachers, some wealthy farmers, some of whom unfortunately soon proved to be inveterate Nazis, and then of course the policeman, our father. People had a proper respect for him back then. They used to tell the little ones that the policeman would punish naughty children, although of course he was concerned only about adults who had committed punishable offenses.
A real one-of-a-kind character was Andreas Brand. Besides his occupation as a barber, he was also a clockmaker, electrician, insurance agent, gas station owner, and photographer. He took the first photos of us children. When he disappeared behind his gigantic apparatus, we always heard him say, “Keep still, now!” but at first something always went wrong. He was somewhat slow and rather taciturn besides, but he was always able to take care of himself somehow and eventually managed in every situation. Somewhere along the line, in 1934 or 1935, we then bought a very simple camera of our own, a Kodak camera that cost three or four and a half marks. We were immensely proud of that camera, even though, naturally, it could not take photos as good as the ones Brand took in his studio. Later the Americans took the camera with them when they were occupying our house near Traunstein in 1945, which made us very sad at the time.
Next door to us was the Ametsbichler brewery; they were the wealthiest family in that place. They had five children; the older, Thomas, was already at boarding school; the second, who was also named Georg, was in my class; the fourth, Barbel, was exactly as old as my brother and attended the same class with him in 1933. Since they walked the same path to school, they went to school together and probably also befriended each other. Other than that, we boys at that age did not have much contact with girls. Boys just have a different temperament. Even in the classrooms, boys and girls sat separately; on the left side, the girls; on the right side, the boys. As a result, there were simply more friendships among us boys, and the girls likewise kept to themselves. It was similar in our family. At first Maria and I were the older ones, and we two stood opposite to my brother. Later, though, we two boys stuck together and our sister became more attached to Mother. In any case, she could tell good stories and always reported to us in detail what she had experienced at school. Being younger, we always listened attentively, since we wanted to know what was ahead of us when it was our turn to go to school. Yet we practically never played together as a threesome. As brothers, Joseph and I were one heart and one soul. Naturally we also quarreled and fought, that is part of it, but by and large we were inseparable, and that remained so our whole life long.
Were you well-behaved boys or real Bavarian rascals?
I think we were somewhere in the middle! We were not especially well-behaved, that was clear. I would say that my brother was somewhat better behaved than I. But we were not real rascals, either, who started all sorts of trouble; you cannot say that.
What trouble did those boys start, then?
Well, on the other side of our house lived a small farmer who owned an oxcart. He always walked five paces ahead of the team and called back, “Vee-ah!” Do you know the commands used to drive cattle? At the sound of “vee-ah!” they started off; at “hü!” they stopped; at “hott”, they turned right; and at “wust”, they turned left. He always used to call “vee-ah!” and “hü” but did not even turn around when he did so. So it often happened that “wicked” schoolboys secretly stopped the oxcart so the farmer arrived home all alone. Suddenly the cart was no longer behind him!
Life in Aschau was naturally quite different from our time in the city, in Tittmoning, which had more of an urban character. But that really did not interest us very much. We did go regularly into the fields, for instance, in the spring to pick lamb’s lettuce, but otherwise we had relatively little to do with farming. It was already clear to both of us that our vo
cation was in an entirely different field and that Aschau was only an intermediate station along that path.
A very likable saint, Konrad von Parzham (1818-1894) lived during the nineteenth century. After working for years as a farmer, at the age of thirty-one he entered the Capuchin monastery of Altötting, and he served there for the rest of his life as porter. He practiced sacrificial love by his willingness to help everyone who asked him for counsel and help. Neither age nor sickness kept him from performing his duties eighteen hours a day. Finally, though, when he was utterly exhausted and near death, he asked his superior to relieve him, and he died three days later. Pope Pius XI, who beatified Brother Konrad in 1930 and canonized him in 1934, explained: “In him shine forth purity and humility, love for God and neighbor, fidelity to duty”—duties that impressed young Joseph Ratzinger, also. So even later he often asked himself how it was that God shows himself most clearly in simple people. That also became for him an incentive never to forget his own roots and never to “stand out” intellectually.
I still remember well the beatification of Brother Konrad in 1934 on May 20 (Pentecost), for which we of course made another pilgrimage to Altötting. We three children stood there with our mother and watched endless crowds of people file past us in the solemn candlelight procession, fervently praying, “O Mary, help me, O Mary do help me, a poor sinner implores you.” For me as a youngster, only ten years old, that seemed somewhat tiresome, but nevertheless I found it very impressive to see so many people, all of them holding candles in their hands and calling on the Mother of God.
The monastery church fascinated me, too, especially the Chapel of Grace, the gallery of which was covered from top to bottom with votive plaques donated by people who had implored the Blessed Virgin in times of great need and received help from her. They were for us a visible sign of the miracles that took place there, the fact that the Mother of God works even in this world and has delivered people from their troubles and problems. In those days, people still made their way along that gallery on their knees while praying the Rosary. So we knew that those people had a serious concern or an important petition and were entrusting themselves confidently to Mary’s protection and help. The penitential practice of praying on their knees served to make reparation and to intensify their prayer.
But the day of the canonization, of course, was centered on Brother Konrad. We children really did not know much about him, only that he was a very good man who got to heaven because he was so kind and led a faith-filled Christian life. Even that impressed us and incited us to follow his example. It was good to know that right nearby a man once lived who now was surely in heaven with the dear Lord and could serve as an example for us.
But it was also a dramatic day. On that occasion we had a bowl of soup for lunch in the convent of the “English Ladies”, and there was a wasp or a bee in it that stung my brother on the eye. My brother has an allergic reaction to bee venom. His eye was badly swollen, as a result and he suffered for the rest of the day of the canonization from the consequences of that sting.
In Altötting I began to become interested in the stands where you could buy devotional objects. Many nice little things were offered there that we boys could use while playing pastor, for example, little monstrances, miniature chalices, candlesticks, and many other things, and of course candles, too, in all possible shapes and sizes. My brother and I enjoyed playing at being priests. In Catholic families in those days, it was a popular children’s game, which of course had the additional purpose of preparing boys to serve at the altar and perhaps even for a later vocation to the priesthood. Children’s altars with little chalices, monstrances, and so on, could be bought then in any toy store, and of course we had one, too, although ours was built by our Uncle Benno from Rimsting. It was a really beautiful high altar, which he even equipped with a rotating tabernacle. The preparation of the gifts took place with little cruets and chalices made of tin. Naturally we used water instead of wine for the make-believe consecration. We also had a censer, which often got tangled up when it was swung, and even Mass vestments that had been made by the seamstress who sewed clothing for our mother and sister. Her name was Wally Kifinger, and she lived on the other side of the Aschau stream that ran through the whole place. You arrived at her house by way of a narrow footbridge. She had an invalid sister by the name of Fanny, who lived in her house and for decades had been confined to bed. As an altar server, I went every day with the pastor over the narrow footbridge to Wally’s house to bring Communion to her sister. The pastor made these sick calls in a cassock with a stole and ciborium, and I walked ahead with a bell in my hand and rang it. The people whom we met along the way knelt down and made the sign of the cross, for they knew we were carrying the Blessed Sacrament with us. Every day we went to see her, whether it was summer or winter. In winter the footbridge was usually iced over, and so it was not such a simple matter. Most of the people in Aschau were deeply religious Catholics. There were also several sodalities that celebrated their feast days splendidly.
There was much excitement in our house shortly after we moved in, when the harmonium that our father had bought was delivered to Aschau. I can still remember well that wonderful instrument. It had thirteen registers, including an unusual one: an Äolsharfe [Aeolian harp], which is a 2’ stop in the bass; the registers are called 8’, 16’, and 4’, corresponding to the respective octaves of the pitches they produce. We were all tremendously impressed by it all, but of course we could not yet play music. And so Father then went to the pastor and asked him whether he knew of a teacher for us, that is, for my sister and me at first. He knew of no one except his lyceum student Else Pölzl. At that time a lyceum was a sort of a secondary school for older daughters, which was attended by girls from the better families after they had completed elementary school. Else gave each of us a half-hour lesson once a week, so that we at least learned the basics, for she did not know much about music, either. In return, she then received a certain amount of pocket money from Father. Her sister Hilde, incidentally, was in the same class as our sister. She later married and had five sons, three of whom joined the Regensburger Domspatzen. I am still in contact with them today.
My career as a church musician began quite unexpectedly. This is how it happened. Our teacher was also our organist and church music director, but he was also a Nazi through and through. It went so far that often he even came to school in his brown shirt. Later, during the war, he was drafted and fell in action. At any rate, one day he was no longer willing to play the organ in church on weekdays. He said that it could not be done; the “Führer” did not want it; he had to be in the school. But since we had a school Mass every morning, our pastor did not want the children to have to do without music entirely, either. So he bought a harmonium and asked me whether I could play. I felt I had in the meantime mastered the instrument sufficiently to accompany the hymns the children sang, and so I gladly accepted the invitation. That was in 1934, and I was ten years old at the time. Back then I would bring the sheet music from the organ to use. One day, though, the music book was not in its place, and I wondered what I could do; I finally decided to play the hymns from memory. Later, the pastor, who knew something about music, said that everything had gone right. I must say I was just a bit proud of the fact that I as a ten-year-old at the time could accompany the hymns without a hymnal. It was not even difficult for me, and my mother was very happy, whereas my father, a rather sober fellow, said nothing, which was just like him, though.
The chronicle of the parish in Aschau notes on December 20, 1934: “A fifth-grade pupil”, meaning Georg Ratzinger, “splendidly accompanied the German sung Mass and the Latin choral Mass.”
Later my brother, Joseph, had harmonium lessons, too. At that time my sister was already attending a domestic-help school in the convent in Au. It was a school where girls could learn many practical skills, from stenography, bookkeeping, and typing to home economics. Therefore, we were well acquainted with the sisters in that convent
, and each week our mother brought Joseph to one of them, who was instructing Maria to play the harmonium. He then had his harmonium lessons with the sister at the convent.
Later, at the seminary, he also learned how to play the piano. Of course, the piano is the real keyboard instrument, and the harmonium is only a poor imitation of the organ, and anyone who wants to accomplish something on a keyboard instrument should first know how to play the piano. Yet in our case the sequence was just a little different. Not until my parents moved in 1937 to Traunstein did we find out that there at the outskirts of the town stood a house of the “English Ladies” where used pianos were sold. Then Father bought us a piano, too, and we were able to take piano lessons.
As cathedral choirmaster-emeritus, what is your opinion of the Holy Father’s musical talent?
I admit that it was easier for me, yet he was certainly musical and also enjoyed music and was very adept at playing. After all, it takes brains, too. He promptly learned to read music; he understood a piece of music very quickly, a process in which his intellectual receptivity and his ability to react rapidly were a great advantage. Still, he did not take to music quite as spontaneously as I did. I always loved music passionately. In this respect, he was a little more restrained, although he is a very musical person.
In any event, transporting his piano from his cardinalatial residence to the Apostolic Palace in 2005 caused the moving crew considerable headaches.
That’s right. Today, though, it stands in the papal apartment in the living room, which is right next to the dining room.
My Brother, the Pope Page 6
