Pope Benedict XVI to resign, citing age and waning energy
Pope Benedict XVI to resign, citing age and waning energy
Pope Benedict XVI said Monday that he will resign at the end of February because he no longer has the strength to fulfill the duties of his office, news services reported.
Benedict, 85, is the first pope to resign in nearly 600 years. His decision means that for the first time in centuries, there will be a living former pope looking on as his successor leads the Catholic church.
“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,” Benedict said in a statement issued by the Vatican at midday in Rome (6 a.m. Washington time).
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Permalink Reply by Dawn Marie on
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List of cardinals who can vote in the conclave
February 22, 2013. (Romereports.com) (-ONLY VIDEO-) The number of cardinals eligible to vote in the upcoming conclave stands at 117, but could decrease for health reasons. Already Jakarta Cardinal Julius Darmaatmadja said he would not be traveling to Rome due to ill health. Here is a list of the participating cardinals, so far, listed by age and area:
The number of cardinals eligible to vote in the upcoming conclave stands at 117, but could decrease for health reasons. Already Jakarta Cardinal Julius Darmaatmadja said he would not be traveling to Rome due to ill health.
Here is a list of the participating cardinals, so far, listed by age and area:
EUROPE:
Walter Kasper, 79 (Germany)
Severino Poletto, 79 (Italy)
Godfried Danneels, 79 (Belgium)
Raffaele Farina, 79 (Italy)
Joachim Meisner, 79 (Germany)
Giovanni Batista Re, 79 (Italy)
Dionigi Tettamanzi, 78 (Italy)
Francesco Monterisi, 78 (Italy)
Carlos Amigo Vallejo, 78 (Spain)
Paolo Sardi, 78 (Italy)
Paul Josef Cordes, 78 (Germany)
Franc Rodé, 78 (Slovenia)
Tarcisio Bertone, 78 (Italy)
Giovanni Lajolo, 78 (Italy)
Velasio De Paolis, 77 (Italy)
Santos Abril y Castelló, 77 (Spain)
Jose da Cruz Policarpo, 76 (Portugal)
Karl Lehmann, 76 (Germany)
Antonio María Rouco Varela, 76 (Spain)
Ennio Antonelli, 76 (Italy)
Andrys Juozas Backis, 76 (Lithuania)
Attilio Nicora, 75 (Italy)
Lluís Martínez Sistach, 75 (Spain)
Antonio Maria Vegliò, 75 (Italy)
Paolo Romeo, 75 (Italy)
Francesco Coccopalmerio, 74 (Italy)
Keith O'Brien, 74 (Scotland)
Manuel Monteiro de Castro, 74 (Portugal)
Carlo Caffarra, 74 (Italy)
Angelo Amato, 74 (Italy)
Stanislaw Dziwisz, 73 (Poland)
Seán Brady, 73 (Ireland)
Zenon Grocholewski, 73 (Poland)
Agostino Vallini, 72 (Italy)
Angelo Scola, 71 (Italy)
Giuseppe Bertello, 70 (Italy)
Gianfranco Ravasi, 70 (Italy)
André Armand Vingt-Trois, 70 (France)
Domenico Calcagno, 70 (Italy)
Angelo Bagnasco, 70 (Italy)
Jean-Louis Tauran, 69 (France)
Dominik Duka, 69 (Czech Republic)
Crescenzio Sepe, 69 (Italy)
Giuseppe Versaldi, 69 (Italy)
Angelo Comastri, 69 (Italy)
Mauro Piacenza, 68 (Italy)
Jean-Pierre Ricard, 68 (France)
Christoph Schönborn, 68 (Austria)
Stanislaw Rylko, 67 (Poland)
Vinko Puljic, 67 (Bosnia)
Antonio Cañizares Llovera, 67 (Spain)
Fernando Filoni, 66 (Italy)
Giuseppe Betori, 65 (Italy)
Josip Bozanic, 63 (Croatia)
Kazimierz Kycz, 63 (Poland)
Kurt Kock. 62 (Switzerland)
Philippe Barbarin, 62 (France)
Péter Erdö, 60 (Hungary)
Wim Eijk, 59 (Netherlands)
Reinhard Marx, 59 (Germany)
Rainer Maria Woelki, 56 (Germany)
NORTH AMERICA:
Justin Francis Rigali, 77 (United States)
Roger Mahony, 76 (United States)
William Joseph Levada, 76 (United States)
Jean-Claude Turcotte, 76 (Canada)
Francis Eugene George, 76 (United States)
Edwin Frederick O'Brien, 73 (United States)
Donald William Wuerl, 72 (United States)
Marc Ouellet, 68 (Canada)
Seán Patrick O'Malley, 68 (United States)
Thomas Christopher Collins, 66 (Canada)
Raymond Leo Burke, 64 (United States)
Daniel DiNardo, 63 (United States)
James Michael Harvey, 63 (United States)
Timothy Michael Dolan, 63 (United States)
LATIN AMERICA:
Juan Sandoval Iñiguez, 79 (Mexico)
Francisco Javier Errázuriz Ossa, 79 (Chile)
Geraldo Majella Angelo, 79 (Brazil)
Raul Eduardo Vela Chiriboga, 79 (Ecuador)
Cláudio Hummes, 78 (Brazil)
Julio Terrazas Sandoval, 76 (Bolivia)
Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino, 76 (Cuba)
Nicolás de Jesús López Rodríguez, 76
(Dominican Republic)
Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 76 (Argentina)
Raymundo Damasceno Assis, 76 (Brazil)
Norberto Rivera Carrera, 70 (Mexico)
Jorge Urosa Savino, 70 (Venezuela)
Ruben Salazar Gómez, 70 (Colombia)
Oscar Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga, 70
(Honduras)
Leonardo Sandri, 69 (Argentina)
Juan Luis Cipriani Throne, 69 (Peru)
Joao Braz de Aviz, 65 (Brazil)
Francisco Robles Ortega, 63 (Mexico)
Odilo Pedro Scherer, 63 (Brazil)
AFRICA:
Antonios Naguib, 77 (Egypt)
Anthony Olubumni Okogie, 76 (Nigeria)
Théodore Adrien Sarr, 76 (Senegal)
Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya, 73 (Congo)
Gabriel Zubeir Wako, 72 (Sudan)
Wilfrid Fox Napier, 71 (South Africa)
John Njue, 69 (Kenya)
John Olorunfemi Oneiyekan, 69 (Nigeria)
Polycarp Pengo, 68 (Tanzania)
Robert Sarah, 67 (Guinea)
Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, 64 (Ghana)
ASIA/OCEANIA:
Jean Baptiste Pham Minh Mân, 78 (Vietnam)
Ivan Dias, 76 (India)
John Tong Hon, 73 (Hong Kong)
Telesphore Placidus Toppo, 73 (India)
Bechara Boutros Rai, 72 (Lebanon)
George Pell, 71 (Australia)
Oswald Gracias, 68 (India)
George Alencherry, 67 (India)
Malcolm Ranjith, 65 (Sri Lanka)
Luis Antonio Tagle, 55 (Philippines)
Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal, 53 (India)
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February 22, 2013. (Romereports.com) There is finally an answer to one of the most popular questions. Once the resignation of Benedict XVI goes into effect on February 28 at 8 p.m. local time in Rome, he will still be addressed as “Your Holiness Benedict XVI.”
According to Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, the president for the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, the same procedure will apply to the Pope as with other bishops and archbishops. After that date, Benedict XVI will be referred to as the Bishop Emeritus of Rome.
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VATICAN CITY: Pope Benedict XVI delivered an emotional last Sunday prayer in St. Peter’s Square, saying that God had told him to devote himself to prayer but assuring supporters he would not “abandon” the Church.
Tens of thousands of supporters turned out for the historic prayers ahead of the pope’s formal resignation on Thursday, often interrupting the pope with their clapping, cheering and chanting.
“The Lord is calling me to climb the mountain, to dedicate myself even more to prayer and meditation. But this does not mean abandoning the Church,” the pope told the crowd from the window of his residence in the Apostolic Palace in Vatican City.
“If God is asking me to do this it is precisely so I can continue to serve with the same dedication and love as before but in a way that is more appropriate for my age and for my strength.”
The 85-year-old leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics has said that he will step down because he no longer has the strength of mind and body to carry on.
His shock resignation ended an eight-year pontificate dominated by the priest child sex abuse scandal and efforts to counter rising secularism in the West.
He thanked the crowd with a final unscripted call, telling them: “We will always be close!”
The Vatican and Rome police estimated the numbers at over 100,000 people—many times more than usually attend the traditional Sunday prayer.
“Holy Father, We Love You,” read one banner seen in the crowd. One read: “Thank You, Your Holiness” and another said: “Dear Father, We’ll Miss You.”
Benedict will be only the second pope to resign of his own free will in the Church’s 2,000-year history and the first to do so since the Middle Ages.
There was tight security in and around the Vatican, with over 100 police officers and snipers on surrounding buildings, as well as two field clinics and hundreds of volunteers to help pilgrims.
The security is being seen as preparation for the pope’s final general audience in St. Peter’s on Wednesday, where some 200,000 people are expected.
Some Italian media have speculated his health may be far worse than the Vatican revealed, and others have said an explosive report into the Vatileaks scandal may be to blame.
The Vatican’s Secretariat of State—effectively the government of the Catholic Church—took the unusual step on Saturday of issuing a formal statement condemning “completely false news stories.”
The Panorama news weekly and the Republica daily said that a report by a committee of cardinals into the leaks of confidential papal papers in 2012 had uncovered allegations of intrigue, corruption and blackmail in the Vatican.
No clear favorite has emerged to succeed Joseph Ratzinger. But many observers said that the cardinals, who make the choice, may plump for a much younger candidate who is a more pastoral figure than the academic Benedict.
A series of meetings of cardinals starting on Friday will determine the date of the start of the conclave to elect a new pope. The Vatican has hinted that it could be brought forward to March since there is no papal funeral.
Conclaves can last for days before a candidate wins a two-thirds majority.
The Vatican has said that Benedict will retire to the papal summer residence of Castel Gandolfo near Rome for the next two or three months while a former monastery inside the Vatican is renovated.
Benedict has said that he will live “hidden from the world” but Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi has said that he could provide “spiritual guidance” to his successor and will likely continue to publish his theological research.
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Three Troubling Aspects of Benedict’s Resignation
27/02/13 08:27
Three Troubling Aspects of Benedict’s Resignation
By John Vennari
Among other concerns, there are three troubling aspects of Benedict’s resignation.
1) It contradicts the aspect of fatherhood that is the nature of the office. In the 1980s, the Eastern Rites bishops were not happy when the Vatican forced them to adopt mandatory retirement at age 75. As one Eastern Rite priest explained to me, “a father of a family does not retire.”
2) It has the appearance of a CEO stepping down and drifting into retirement, which gives the impression of yet more secular structures adopted by the Church.
3) It opens the door for abuse. Even if we take Pope Benedict at his word that he retires because he truly believes he does not have the strength to continue, the precedent is established for a good Pope to be pressured into retirement on the pretext of failing health.
De Mattei’s Worry
It seems clear that Pope Benedict has been thinking about ‘retirement’ for some time. On April 29, 2009, he stopped to visit the tomb of Pope Saint Celestine V, the Pope who abdicated his office in 1296. Benedict prayed at the tomb and left his palium, the symbol of his authority as Bishop of Rome, on top of Celestine’s tomb. On July 4, 2010, he visited the Cathedral of Sulmona, near Rome, and prayed before the relics of Celestine V.
Chiesa webpage reports that Church historian Roberto de Mattei expresses his profound unease with Benedict’s resignation. While he accepts its “legality”, de Mattei notes that from the historical point of view, the resignation of pope Benedict “appears to be in absolute discontinuity with the tradition and praxis of the Church”.
"One cannot make a comparison either with Celestine V, who quit after being dragged away by force from his hermit's cell, or with Gregory XII, who was forced to resign in order to resolve the very serious question of the Great Western Schism. These were exceptional cases. But what is the exception in the action of Benedict XVI? The official reason, engraved in his words of February 11, expresses, more than the exception, the rule.”
It is the “rule” that would simply coincide with “vigor of both body and mind.” But then “the question arises”:
“Over two thousand years of history, how many Popes have reigned in good health and have not witnessed the decline of their powers and have not suffered from illnesses and moral trials of every kind? Physical well-being has never been a criterion of governance of the Church. Will it be so beginning with Benedict XVI?”
If this be the case, writes de Mattei, the action of Benedict XVI takes on an impact “not simply innovative, but revolutionary”:
“The image of the pontifical institution, in the eyes of public opinion all over the world, would in fact be stripped of its sacrality to be handed over to the criteria of judgment of modernity.”
De Mattei notes that this would achieve the objective repeatedly set forth by Hans Küng and other progressive theologians: that of reducing the pope “to the president of a board of administration, to a purely arbitral role, accompanied by a permanent synod of bishops with deliberative powers.”
Excepted from the March 2013 Catholic Family News (now being mailed)
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Permalink Reply by Cathleen on
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This has been bothering me lately; I keep reading "the same thing" more and more from different sources. I will admit that I didn't think through all the implications when I first heard the news of HH's abdication. I think my mind was in a state of shock . But as usual Mr. Vennari lays it out very simply and precisely.
We must continue to pray very hard.
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Cardinal Pell: “I hope we don’t move to a succession of popes who resign quickly.”
The Catholic church doesn't need "the successor of Peter popping in and out," Australia's cardinal said Friday as questions were raised about what Impact Benedict XVI's resignation will have on the choice of his successor.
As Benedict's papacy is officially over, cardinals are starting to raise issues that will take center stage at the conclave where they will gather to elect the new pope. The resignation of a pope and the governing of the church are emerging as topics of debate.
Cardinal George Pell told The Associated Press in an interview that "I hope we don't move to a succession of popes who resign quickly."
Pell was expanding on an earlier statement that Benedict's decision to resign was "slightly destabilizing."
"The instinct I suspect of a number of cardinals would be to look at a somewhat younger person than Cardinal (Joseph) Ratzinger was when he was elected holy father at the age of 78," Pell said.
Despite his worry about the impact of the resignation, Pell said that "you only have to look at him (Benedict) to see how sick he looks. He has deteriorated even in the last couple of months."
In a separate interview, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York said Thursday that Pell probably meant that, like himself, the resignation "kind of shook us and startled us because we are not used to it."
"A pope dying is natural — a pope stepping aside is something new to us. So it was startling," he added.
Another American cardinal, Sean O'Malley of Boston, said "it is a whole new ball game after this resignation" but "it is very difficult to forecast how it will play itself out."
O'Malley did suggest the cardinal electors might decide to elect an older man "realizing that he is not going to have to carry this burden on into his 90s and that if he becomes incapacitated," he could resign — in line with Benedict's explanation that he was no longer up to the task.
Pell and others have raised the problem of governance in light of the scandal over leaks of Vatican documents by the pope's butler and the need to tighten procedures in the Curia, the central offices of the church.
"It would be useful to have a pope who can pull the show together, lift the morale of the Curia, and strengthen a bit of the discipline there and effectively draw on all the energies and goodness of the great majority of the people in the curia," Pell said.
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It remains necessary to pray for him and to pray for his conversion. He has certainly left the Church in a mess.
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Permalink Reply by Alley on
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Amen! And so I pray, with love and confidence in Our Lord and Blessed Mother who are in control.
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