Pope Benedict XVI said Monday he lacks the strength to fulfill
his duties and on Feb. 28 will become the first pontiff in 600 years to
resign. The announcement sets the stage for a conclave in March to elect
a new leader for world's 1 billion Catholics.
The 85-year-old Pope announced the bombshell in Latin during a meeting
of Vatican cardinals, surprising even his closest collaborators, even
though Benedict had made clear in the past he would step down if he
became too old or infirm to do the job.
Benedict called his choice "a decision of great importance for the life of the church."
Indeed, the move allows the Vatican to hold a conclave before Easter to
elect a new Pope, since the traditional mourning time that would follow
the death of a Pope doesn't have to be observed.
It will also allow Benedict to hold great sway over the choice of his
successor. He has already hand-picked the bulk of the College of
Cardinals — the princes of the church who will elect the next Pope — to
guarantee his conservative legacy and ensure an orthodox future for the
church.
There are several papal contenders in the wings, but no obvious
front-runner — the same situation when Benedict was elected pontiff in
2005 after the death of Pope John Paul II.
The Vatican stressed that no specific medical condition prompted
Benedict's decision, but in recent years, the Pope has slowed down
significantly, cutting back his foreign travel and limiting his
audiences. He now goes to and from the altar in St. Peter's Basilica on a
moving platform, to spare him the long walk down the aisle.
Occasionally he uses a cane.
His 89-year-old brother, Georg Ratzinger, said doctors had recently advised the Pope not to take any more trans-Atlantic trips.
"His age is weighing on him," Ratzinger told the dpa news agency. "At this age my brother wants more rest."
Benedict emphasized that carrying out the duties of being Pope — the
leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics worldwide — requires "both
strength of mind and body."
"After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come
to the certainty that my strengths due to an advanced age are no longer
suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry," he told the
cardinals.
"In order to govern the [ship] of St. Peter and proclaim the Gospel,
both strength of mind and body are necessary — strengths which, in the
last few months, have deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had
to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted
to me," he said.
Popes are allowed to resign; church law specifies only that the
resignation be "freely made and properly manifested." But only a handful
have done it.
The last Pope to resign was Pope Gregory XII, who stepped down in 1415
in a deal to end the Great Western Schism among competing papal
claimants. The most famous resignation was Pope Celestine V in 1294;
Dante placed him in hell for it.
When Benedict was elected at age 78, he was the oldest Pope chosen in
nearly 300 years. At the time, he had already been planning to retire as
the Vatican's chief orthodoxy watchdog to spend his final years writing
in the "peace and quiet" of his native Bavaria.
On Monday, Benedict said he would serve the church for the remainder of
his days "through a life dedicated to prayer." The Vatican said
immediately after his resignation that Benedict would go to Castel
Gandolfo, the papal summer retreat south of Rome, and then would live in
a cloistered monastery.
Contenders to be his successor include Cardinal Angelo Scola, archbishop
of Milan; Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, the archbishop of Vienna; and
Cardinal Marc Ouellet, the Canadian head of the Vatican's office for
bishops.
Long shots include Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York. Although Dolan is
popular and backs the Pope's conservative line, the general thinking is
that the Catholic Church doesn't need a Pope from a "superpower."
Given half of the world's Catholics live in the global south, there will
once again be arguments for a Pope to come from the developing world.
Cardinal Antonio Tagle, the archbishop of Manila, has impressed many
Vatican watchers, but at 56 and having only been named a cardinal last
year, he is considered too young.
Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson of Ghana is one of the
highest-ranking African cardinals at the Vatican, currently heading the
Vatican's office for justice and peace, but he's something of a wild
card.
All cardinals under age 80 are allowed to vote in the conclave, the
secret meeting held in the Sistine Chapel where cardinals cast ballots
to elect a new Pope. As per tradition, the ballots are burned after each
voting round; black smoke that snakes out of the chimney means no Pope
has been chosen, while white smoke means a Pope has been elected.
The pontiff had been due to attend World Youth Day in July in Rio de
Janeiro; by then his successor will have been named and will presumably
make the trip.
Benedict himself raised the possibility of resigning if he were simply
too old or sick to continue on, when he was interviewed in 2010 for the
book "Light of the World."
"If a Pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically,
psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his
office, then he has a right, and, under some circumstances, also an
obligation to resign," Benedict said.
The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had an intimate view as Pope John
Paul II, with whom he had worked closely for nearly a quarter-century,
suffered through the debilitating end of his papacy.
The announcement took the Vatican — and the rest of the world — by surprise.
Several cardinals on Monday didn't even understand what Benedict had
said during the consistory, said the Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican
spokesman. Others who did were stunned.
"All the cardinals remained shocked and were looking at each other,"
said Monsignor Oscar Sanchez of Mexico, who was in the room when
Benedict made his announcement.
Benedict was born April 16, 1927, in Marktl Am Inn, in Bavaria, but his
father, a policeman, moved frequently and the family left when he was 2.
In his memoirs, Benedict dealt what could have been a source of
controversy had it been kept secret — that he was enlisted in the Nazi
youth movement against his will when he was 14 in 1941, when membership
was compulsory. He said he was soon let out because of his studies for
the priesthood. Two years later he was drafted into a Nazi anti-aircraft
unit as a helper. He deserted the German army in April 1945, in the
waning days of the war.
He called it prophetic that a German followed a Polish pope — with both men coming from such different sides of World War II.
Benedict was ordained, along with his brother, in 1951. After spending
several years teaching theology in Germany, he was appointed bishop of
Munich in 1977 and elevated to cardinal three months later by Pope Paul
VI.
John Paul named him leader of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the
Faith in 1981 and he took up his post a year later. Following John
Paul's death in 2005, he was elected Pope on April 19 in one of the
fastest conclaves in history, just about 24 hours after the voting
began.
