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Hildesheim Bishop Wilmer: "Cleverness is not enough to be redeemed"
Photo: Holger Hollemann / picture alliance / dpa
SPIEGEL
: In your new book on Christian virtues, you quote the "Dirty Old Man" of US literature, Charles Bukowski.
What can a Catholic bishop learn from a promiscuous drinker?
Heiner Wilmer
: For me, it's not about Bukowski's addiction, but about his love for life, the desire for new things, the courage to go on adventures, to trust yourself and others.
Bukowski was anything but naive, but despite all his skepticism, he had an eye for the horizon, a longing for breadth and size.
He was a reflective man, a great thinker who could raise his head without becoming arrogant.
He always paid attention to the details, the small, the gentle, the fragile.
SPIEGEL
: A book of poetry by Bukowski is called "What matters most is how well you get through a fire".
How a person approaches challenges - is that God given?
Wilmer:
We all have different crisis experiences.
Some go through a fire that is hell on earth.
But not everyone reacts to it in the same way.
Some despair, become discouraged and burn.
Some take their own lives.
Then there are people who develop an incredible inner strength, a hope that is indestructible.
A hope for someone to carry it, to save it.
This hope is so strong that they develop a very high tolerance for frustration.
The villains of the world can take everything from them - but not their inner freedom and their pride.
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