3 August 2006

MUNICH - ­ Pope Benedict XVI is to give an unprecedented interview Saturday to four German TV journalists invited to his summer residence, Castel Gandolfo, with the discussion set to air worldwide on August 13.

The German-born pope has already given a couple of one-on-one television interviews in his year-long papacy, but no head of the Catholic church has ever gone before the cameras to handle a panel of questioners for a full hour.

"Nothing like this ever occurred with Pope John Paul II," recalls Father Eberhard von Gemmingen, head of the German section of Vatican Radio, who is to be one of the four interviewers.

The other journalists will be from two German public television channels, ARD and ZDF, and from Germany's state-funded worldwide TV service, Deutsche Welle. The interview precedes the pope's September 9-14 visit to his German homeland.

As Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the present pope often appeared to lack the easy confidence of a TV personality. But since his election in April last year, he has reached out to the mass media. The panel discussion arose from the pope's own invitation.

John Paul was poised in his dealings with the media and crowds - von Gemmingen describes him as a "genius with the media" - but he never gave long interviews on TV: he did answer questions by journalists but this was mostly spontaneous and intermittent.

Von Gemmingen, who conducted a Vatican radio interview with the pope last year before his first visit to Germany for a Catholic youth convention in August, says, "Pope Benedict knows that the media can help him speak to millions of people."

Later, a Polish Jesuit priest interviewed Benedict on television before the pope visited Poland in May.

Thomas Bellut, director of programming at ZDF, who will be another interviewer, calls the event a "world first."

"I'm already wondering what kind of atmosphere there'll be in Castel Gandolfo," he said.

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