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VATICAN CITY — During a Mass in which priests renew their promises of fidelity to Christ, Pope Benedict XVI firmly criticized dissent from church teachings and disobedience of God's will as illegitimate pathways toward reform and renewal.

Surrounded by more than 1,600 priests, bishops and cardinals, the pope cautioned against calls for women's ordination, saying such campaigns seemed more "a desperate push" to fulfill one's own preferences rather than a sincere attempt to conform one's life more closely to Christ.

During the April 5 chrism Mass in St. Peter's Basilica, which focuses on Holy Thursday as the day Jesus shared his priesthood with the apostles, the pope said he wanted to use the occasion to ask all priests, including himself, to meditate upon what their consecration really means.

Pictured: Pope Benedict XVI washes the foot of a priest during the Mass of the Lord's Supper at the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome April 5. The foot-washing ritual reflects the call to imitate Christ by serving one another. (CNS photo/Claudio Peri, pool via Reuters)

"Are you resolved to be more united with the Lord Jesus and more closely conformed to him," which entails a renunciation of oneself and "of the much-vaunted self-fulfillment," the pope asked.

Being Christ-like means not to be served but to serve, not taking but giving, he said.

If that is the nature of the priesthood, then what should be the response of priests when faced with "the often dramatic situation of the church today," the pope asked.

Without specifying the country, Pope Benedict said a group of priests from a European nation have issued a call for disobedience of church teaching, specifically regarding the question of women's ordination.

Last year, the president of the Austrian bishops' conference, Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, condemned a "Call to Disobedience," signed by 250 of Austria's 4,200 Catholic priests. The document urged Catholics to begin a campaign in support of women priests and "priestless eucharistic liturgies," as well as for Communion to be given to non-Catholics and remarried divorcees.

Also, 311 theologians from Austria, Germany and Switzerland signed a memorandum last year demanding the ordination of women and married men, as well as an "open dialogue" on the church's "structures of power and communication."

Pictured: Pope Benedict XVI celebrates Holy Thursday chrism Mass in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican April 5. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Pope Benedict asked, "Is disobedience a path of renewal for the church?" adding that Blessed John Paul II taught "irrevocably that the church has received no authority from the Lord" to ordain women.

Pope Benedict said perhaps such campaigns are motivated by concern for the church and believe that "the slow pace of institutions has to be overcome by drastic measures, in order to open up new paths and bring the church up-to-date."

"But is disobedience really a way to do this?" the pope asked.

True renewal must be based on lives that are radically conformed to Christ and God's will, he said.

Christ did seek to correct errors in human traditions, the pope said, but only those customs that stifled God's word and will, seeking to eliminate "human caprice" so as to reveal God's authentic desire for his people.

Being humble, subservient, and obedient to God and following church teaching are not excuses "to defend inertia, the fossilization of traditions," the pope said.

The era following the Second Vatican Council showed what a process of "true renewal" looks like, and it can be seen in many of the new movements and ways of life that are "filled with the joy of faith, the radicalism of obedience, the dynamic of hope and the power of love," he said.

Presiding over the first of two Holy Thursday liturgies, Pope Benedict blessed the oils that will be used in the sacraments of baptism, confirmation, ordination and the anointing of the sick.

Deacons carried the oils in large silver urns to the main altar while catechumens, youths preparing for confirmation, the sick and deacons about to be ordained in the Diocese of Rome wheeled small tables carrying large, artistic urns, which also contained sacramental oils.

In his homily, the pope called on all priests to continue to look to Christ and the saints for guidance in how best to serve and renew the church and minister to humanity.

"God is not concerned so much with great numbers and with outward successes, but achieves his victories under the humble sign of the mustard seed," the pope said.

He urged bishops and priests to remember their role as teachers and to use the upcoming Year of Faith to combat "the growing religious illiteracy found in the midst of our sophisticated society."

"We preach not private theories and opinions, but the faith of the church," he said. Accurate, authentic guides of what the church teaches can be found not only in sacred Scripture, but also the texts of Vatican II, the Catechism of the Catholic Church and Pope John Paul II's writings, which "are still far from being explored," he said.

However, such teaching will only be credible when those preaching live lives that are visibly touched and shaped by Christ and his word, the pope said.

Later in the day at Rome's Basilica of St. John Lateran, the pope celebrated the Mass of the Lord's Supper, which commemorates Jesus' institution of the Eucharist and the priesthood.

During the evening Mass, Pope Benedict washed the feet of 12 priests from the Diocese of Rome. The ritual reflected the call to imitate Christ by serving one another and forgiving each other.

The pope poured water from a golden pitcher onto the foot of each priest, then gently rubbed each foot dry with a white towel.

In his homily, the pope said pride and wanting to be free to do as one wants is "the real essence of sin."

When Jesus spent the night on the Mount of Olives deep in prayer and wracked with anguish, he asked God to spare him of the evil that awaited him: betrayal, denial, torture and death, the pope said.

He struggled, looking deep into the night of evil and saw "the filthy flood of all the lies and all the disgrace which he will encounter in that chalice from which he must drink," the pope said. "He also sees me, and he prays for me."

Here, Jesus performs the office of a priest, the pope said, by taking "upon himself the sins of humanity, of all of us, and he brings us before the father."

Though he begged to be spared, Jesus puts his life in God's hands and asks that God's will be done, the pope said. Jesus transformed the attitude of Adam and healed humanity.

Adam's pride can be seen in people who believe they need to be free of God in order to be really free, he said.

"This is the fundamental rebellion present throughout history and the fundamental lie which perverts life."

Without God, people are alienated from themselves and "we are free only if we stand in the truth of our being, if we are united to God," he said.

The collection taken up at the Mass was earmarked by the pope to offer humanitarian aid to Syrian refugees.

Editor's Note: The text of the pope's chrism Mass homily in English is posted online at http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20120405_messa-crismale_en.html.

The English text of his homily at the evening Mass is posted online at http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20120405_coena-domini_en.html.

— Carol Glatz, Catholic News Service