The Dialog

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — Parrots may squawk in the Vatican Gardens during a conclave, but the cardinals are not allowed to tweet.

For most of the 117 red-vested princes of the church who are eligible to vote for a new pope, Twitter isn’t an issue at all. But the College of Cardinals does include at least nine active tweeters. From the moment they enter the Sistine Chapel to cast their ballots, they will be forbidden access to their accounts along with all other forms of communication with the outside world.

An unadorned bedroom at the Domus Sancta Marthae, the residence where cardinal electors will rest during the conclave. (CNS file)

Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York (@CardinalDolan) informed his almost 80,000 Twitter followers when Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation Feb. 11.

As of Feb. 15, Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley of Boston (@CardinalSean) had not mentioned the pope’s resignation on his Twitter feed. In fact, the last tweet to his more than 9,200 followers was posted two days before the pope’s announcement.

After the pope’s announcement, Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, (@CardRavasi) president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, almost immediately tweeted a traditional prayer in Latin: “Sub tuum praesidium confugimus, sancta Dei Genetrix” (“Under thy protection we seek refuge, O Holy Mother of God.”)

The Italian cardinal, often mentioned on pundits’ lists of possible popes, has more than 35,400 followers and tweets frequently.

Brazilian Cardinal Odilo Scherer of Sao Paulo (@DomOdiloScherer) is not a daily tweeter. But on Feb. 14 he used Twitter, with its 140-character maximum for messages, to comment, “I am impressed with the interpretations I have read of the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI.”

The cardinal has more than 22,700 Twitter followers.

Italian Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan (@angeloscola), another cardinal appearing on many pope-watch lists, had not commented on the pope’s resignation to his almost 16,800 followers as of Feb. 15.

South African Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban (@CardinalNapier) has thanked his almost 3,100 Twitter followers for their promise of prayers. “Keep praying for a truly Christ-like leader,” he messaged them.

Spanish Cardinal Lluis Martinez Sistach of Barcelona (@sistachcardenal) told his 2,300 followers that he thanked the pope “for all he’s done for the church and the world.”

The cardinal also told them that the pope’s resignation “is an expression of his deep spirituality and great love for the church.”

Like Cardinal Dolan, Colombian Cardinal Ruben Salazar Gomez of Bogota (@cardenalruben) follows only Pope Benedict (@Pontifex). He used his account to say, “Holy Father, the Colombian church accompanies you with its prayer at (the time of) this honest and courageous decision.”

He then asked his nearly 2,900 followers to offer their Lenten fasting for the pope and “the future of the church.”

Cardinal Roger M. Mahony (@CardinalMahony), retired archbishop of Los Angeles, just started tweeting in January. He had more than 260 followers by Feb. 15.

When the pope resigned, he tweeted: “Am planning to be in Rome and vote for the next pope. Will be tweeting daily.”

And a few days later, he reassured his followers: “The Holy Spirit is in charge, not the media; we will be shown God’s chosen one.”

Two weeks before the pope made his announcement, the Italian Jesuit magazine Popoli and the media firm Oogo did a brief survey of eight of the cardinals’ Twitter accounts.

Cardinal Scola started tweeting in May 2009, it said. Cardinals Ravasi, Scherer and Napier began in July 2011. Cardinals O’Malley, Martinez Sistach and Dolan began in March 2012, and Cardinal Salazar just launched his account in December.

The magazine also looked at the percentage of “retweets” or messages sent out by the cardinals to their followers, then re-launched to their followers’ followers.

Cardinal Scola scored lowest with a 40 percent retweet rate, while Cardinal Dolan topped the list at 100 percent, which is the same retweet rate @Pontifex enjoys. The others have a retweet rate of between 82 percent and 90 percent, Popoli reported.

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — When Pope Benedict XVI, 85, announced his resignation, he said that “both strength of mind and body are necessary” to carry out the papal ministry in the modern world.

He was elected in 2005, just after his 78th birthday. Of the 102 popes whose exact age at election is known, Pope Benedict was one of 17 churchmen elected bishop of Rome while between the ages of 71 and 80.

Ambrogio Piazzoni, vice prefect of the Vatican Library and author of a book on the history of papal elections, distributed a sheet of “some curiosities” about elections to reporters Feb. 21, the day after briefing journalists at the Vatican.

On the topic of the age of the pope at election, he said: Read more »

By TheDialog

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI’s historic decision to resign at the end of February has astonished and perplexed the world in many ways, not least because of what might be called the mystery of the missing encyclical.

In December, the Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, said that Pope Benedict’s fourth encyclical (a letter from the pope to the faithful) would be released in the first half of 2013. Treating the subject of faith, the encyclical would complete a trilogy on the three theological virtues, following “Deus Caritas Est” (2005) on charity, and “Spe Salvi” (2007) on hope.

Pope Benedict XVI signs a copy of his encyclical, “Caritas in Veritate” (“Charity in Truth”"), at the Vatican in July 2009. (CNS photo/L’Osservatore Romano via Reuters)

Then, on the day after the pope’s announcement, Father Lombardi announced that Pope Benedict would not issue another encyclical after all.

The news was surprising because it suggested that Pope Benedict, a former professor who has placed a priority on his teaching role as pope, had abandoned the most prominent teaching project of his pontificate just before its completion. This, even though Father Lombardi said that the pope had pondered resignation for several months, and the Vatican newspaper reported that he first considered the move in March 2012.

It was hardly plausible that so prolific an author might be suffering from writer’s block, even given the deteriorating “strength of mind and body” he cited in announcing his resignation. Three days after that announcement, Pope Benedict delivered a highly structured, 46-minute long public talk, without a prepared text and only occasionally consulting his notes.

But unlike an off-the-cuff speech, papal encyclicals are not one-man productions. Though the pope ultimately determines their content, they are typically the fruit of much behind-the-scenes collaboration with Vatican officials and often with outside consultants as well. Pope Benedict’s last encyclical, “Caritas in Veritate” (2009), appeared more than a year after its expected date, reportedly because of complications in this process. It is likely that such was the case again this time.

Father Lombardi has suggested that the former Pope Benedict might eventually publish the document under his own name, in which case it would not rank as part of the papal magisterium. But it is at least as likely that his successor will take up and finish the task.

Popes tend to honor their predecessors’ commitments, which is why everyone assumes that the next pope will travel to Rio de Janeiro for World Youth Day in July. Indeed, Pope Benedict’s own first encyclical, “Deus Caritas Est,” was started by his predecessor, Blessed John Paul II.

If the next pope does finish the encyclical on faith, there is reason to think that his predecessor will be happy to have left it incomplete.

A major papal document whose production bridged the transition between the two pontificates could serve as a reassuring sign of continuity after Pope Benedict’s practically unprecedented move. At the same time, since the next pope would undoubtedly stamp the encyclical with his distinctive priorities and style, it would exemplify Pope Benedict’s ideal of reform as “innovation in continuity” with church tradition.

Pope Benedict has been careful throughout his pontificate to distinguish his personal writings from his papal documents, by publishing his bestselling series of “Jesus of Nazareth” books under the name Joseph Ratzinger. The knowledge that the next encyclical was the work of more than one pope would further underscore its impersonal character and reinforce the idea, which Pope Benedict has conveyed so dramatically through his resignation, that the papacy is an office distinct from any individual who might hold it.

Only three days before he announced he would step down, the outgoing pope said something that has acquired a more personal meaning in light of that historic event. Commenting on the First Letter of Peter to an audience of seminarians, Pope Benedict noted internal evidence that the apostle and first pope was not the epistle’s sole author.

“He does not write alone, an isolated individual, he writes with the help of the church,” Pope Benedict said. “Peter does not speak as an individual, he speaks ‘ex persona Ecclesiae,’ he speaks as a man of the church … He does not want to say only his word, but truly carries in himself the waters of the faith, the waters of all the church, and precisely this way gives fertility, gives fecundity and is a personal witness who opens himself to the Lord.”

By Catholic News Service

A flash of lighting is seen over St. Peter’s Basilica during a rainstorm at Vatican Feb. 11, the day Pope Benedict XVI surprised the world by announcing that he no longer has the
strength to exercise his ministry and will retire at the end of the month. (CNS photo/ANSA/Alessandro Di Meo via Reuters)

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — For a Catholic so aware of the importance of tradition, even traditions with a small “t,” Pope Benedict XVI had to know he was setting a precedent by resigning.

“This development will offer options that maybe were not too obvious before this courageous decision of Pope Benedict,” said U.S. Cardinal Edwin F. O’Brien, grand master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.

Pope Benedict XVI

Meeting the press in Boston, the city’s Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley agreed, saying the pope’s decision “will obviously have an effect going forward.”

Pope Benedict described his decision to be the first pope to resign in almost 600 years as the result of intense prayer and an examination of his conscience before God. Once in six centuries does not set a rule, but the understanding reception that the pope’s decision has received within the church suggests that it will not be another 600 years before it happens again.

As head of a spiritual community that now numbers about 1.2 billion members all over the world, the pope did not approach the decision as a secular leader would. While he obviously talked to a few people about it, the 85-year-old pope described it as a matter of personal conscience, which implies he may have discussed it with a trusted spiritual guide, but did not seek broad consultation or a consensus.

Even though Pope Benedict and his older brother, Msgr. Georg Ratzinger, are very close, the elder Ratzinger told reporters at a news conference Feb. 11 he was “very surprised” by his brother’s decision, but understood why he did it.

Confirming what the Vatican press spokesman had said, Msgr. Ratzinger told the British Broadcasting Corp. that his brother had been considering stepping down for months; he also told the BBC that the pope’s doctor had advised him not to take any more trans-Atlantic trips.

“When he got to the second half of his 80s, he felt that his age was showing and that he was gradually losing the abilities he may have had and that it takes to fulfill this office properly,” Msgr. Ratzinger told the BBC.

In prayer before God, Pope Benedict had to face important conflicting values: the tradition of a pope serving until death; the faith statement, often repeated by Blessed John Paul II, that God would relieve a pope from office when it was time, meaning the pope would die; and the practical energy needed to minister to a far-flung flock in an age of instant communication where events hit the Internet before any considered, prudent response can be formulated.

An ecumenical partner and esteemed theological colleague of Pope Benedict’s said he was not totally surprised by the pope’s decision. Anglican Bishop Rowan Williams, who stepped down in late December as the archbishop of Canterbury and head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, told Vatican Radio he and Pope Benedict spoke last March about the possibility of being able to retire and devote one’s life completely to prayer and study.

“In our last conversation, I was very conscious that he was recognizing his own frailty, and it did cross my mind to wonder whether this was a step he might think about,” Bishop Williams told Vatican Radio.

While the bishop would not release details of his private conversation with the pope, he said, “It was a sense I had that he was beginning to ask the question, ‘Is it possible to carry on with a good conscience,’ and I’m sure it must be in his mind that for all the previous pope’s immense courage and the example he set in shouldering on to the end, it might not be — now — for the best interests of the whole church.”

Loosening the tradition of leadership until death is a matter the Eastern Catholic churches and even the worldwide Jesuit order have been coming to accept, especially since the Second Vatican Council and particularly given the fact that people live longer today, even in increasing physical and mental frailty.

Jesuit Father Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, the former Jesuit superior, was required to obtain Pope Benedict’s permission to announce his intention to step down in 2008, the year Father Kolvenbach turned 80. A few days after Jesuit Father Adolfo Nicolas was elected to succeed Father Kolvenbach, the new superior told reporters it was unlikely any Jesuit leader again would feel an absolute obligation to serve until death.

In a speech to seminarians of the Diocese of Rome Feb. 8, three days before he announced his resignation, Pope Benedict made a remark that, in hindsight, could help people recognize both the sacrifice Blessed John Paul made by staying in office as Parkinson’s disease ravaged his body and the sacrifice of Pope Benedict stepping down.

Like St. Peter, he said, “We, too, are called to accept the martyrological aspect of Christianity, which can take very different forms.”

“The cross can have very different forms,” Pope Benedict told the seminarians, “but no one can be a Christian without following the Crucified One, without also accepting the moment of martyrdom.”

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — The current staff of the papal apartments, including Archbishop Georg Ganswein, will accompany Pope Benedict XVI to Castel Gandolfo when he leaves office Feb. 28, the Vatican spokesman said.

Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, also repeated his assertion that the conclave to elect a new pope would begin sometime between March 15 and March 20.

A Vatican spokesman has said Archbishop Georg Ganswein, the pope’s personal secretary, will live with Benedict XVI but also serve the new pope as prefect of the papal household. (CNS file)

Correcting information he had given reporters earlier, Father Lombardi said Archbishop Ganswein told him Feb. 14 that he would be living with the pope and with the consecrated laywomen who belong to the Memores Domini Association of the Communion and Liberation movement and serve as the pope’s domestic staff.

Archbishop Ganswein and the women will go to Castel Gandolfo with Pope Benedict and also will move with the pope to the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery, a building in the Vatican Gardens being remodeled for their use, Father Lombardi said.

The Vatican spokesman said Archbishop Ganswein will live with Benedict XVI but also serve the new pope as prefect of the papal household.

Asked how such a dual role could work when Father Lombardi previously had said Pope Benedict would not interfere in the papacy of his successor, the Jesuit said Archbishop Ganswein’s job is primarily one of logistics — organizing the pope’s daily schedule of meetings and audiences — and not a job that brings him into contact with other papal decisions.

By being the first pope to resign in almost 600 years, Pope Benedict opened a whole box of questions that could not be answered immediately and kept Father Lombardi busy responding to media inquiries and making his own.

As the leaders of the College of Cardinals, canon law experts and other Vatican officials worked to gain clarity or come up with practical solutions to problems never raised before, the Vatican spokesman’s daily briefings Feb. 11-14 reflected a work in progress.

The recurring question at the daily briefings has been “When will the conclave start?” Each day, Father Lombardi tells reporters that is up to the leadership of the College of Cardinals, but rules governing the election of a pope say it must begin no fewer than 15 days and no more than 20 days after the papacy is vacant. That would mean a conclave could begin between March 15 and March 20.

Some newspapers have reported individual cardinals suggesting an earlier start, he said, and some have pointed out the 15 days usually include a papal funeral and a mandatory nine days of memorial Masses.

However, the rules for the conclave are issued by a pope, only a pope can change them, “and that is unlikely,” Father Lombardi said Feb. 14. In fact, he said he asked in the Secretariat of State that morning and was told there was no commission working to draft potential changes for Pope Benedict to consider before leaving.

Asked what title Pope Benedict would use after Feb. 28, Father Lombardi had said that was a question still being studied, but it seemed to him that the most accurate title would be “bishop emeritus of Rome.”

When questioned again Feb. 14, he said it still was not clear, though many experts had been voicing their opinions in the media. One thing is certain, he said, “being a bishop is a result of a sacrament,” and that cannot be taken from the pope.

“Being a cardinal, on the other hand, is a title, not the effect of a sacrament, and so it has a different kind of value or importance,” he said.

In addition, he said, Benedict XVI “is his name … and that won’t change.”

Asked if there would be a public ceremony for the breaking of Pope Benedict’s fisherman’s ring, Father Lombardi said he believed the act — the responsibility of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone as chamberlain of the Holy Roman Church — would take place in private, as it does after a pope dies.

Asked if Pope Benedict would receive a pension, Father Lombardi said a retirement fund had not been set up, “but obviously he will be taken care of.”

Asked if Pope Benedict would continue wearing the white papal cassock, the spokesman said he doubted that, since the white robes have a symbolic significance in the popular imagination.

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service

TERNI, Italy — Holding hands as they processed into church, 101 couples approached the mortal remains of St. Valentine, invoking his protection and promising that their upcoming weddings would bind them to one another forever.

The couples, all of whom live in Italy and have scheduled a church wedding in the coming year, gathered Feb. 10 in the Basilica of St. Valentine for the annual “promise Mass,” celebrated the Sunday before the feast of St. Valentine, the third-century martyred bishop of Terni.

Federica Margotti and Simone Feliciello, an engaged couple, wait in a church hall for a special Mass for engaged couples at the Basilica of St. Valentine in Terni, Italy, Feb. 10. Couples pledged their love to each other during the annual “promise Mass,” held in advance of Valentine’s Day. While some details of St. Valentine’s life are lost to history, the local diocese believes he was the martyred 3rd-century bishop of Terni. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Council for the Family, presided over the Mass and told the couples that “in a world that no longer understands love and marriage and family,” their promises are an affirmation that true love is forever and that marriage involves an openness to having children.

After the homily, all of the men, then all of the women said to each other: “I promise to give myself in love to you and ask you to give yourself to me, promising me your love, because we are about to celebrate and live the sacrament of matrimony in the name of the Lord.”

Maria and Pasquale, two 33-year-olds from Rome, said they heard about the promise Mass late last year when their parish priest, who was leading their marriage preparation class, brought the whole class to the basilica for their final session.

“It’s beautiful to make a promise here, before St. Valentine,” said Pasquale, who, like many Italians, identified himself only with his first name.

But Vincenzo, 36, and Patrizia, 30, drove four hours to Terni from their home in Benevento “more for ourselves than for a religious thing. It’s like a good luck wish for our wedding,” Vincenzo said.

Virginia Theresa Yim, 32, of Toronto, and Emanuele Masci, a 29-year-old from Terni, were also among the couples crowded into the tiny basilica.

“It’s a promise, something sweet, to strengthen our marriage,” Masci said.

Yim said she never liked “the commercial side of Valentine’s Day. … I’m not the type of girl who wants chocolates and gifts. Here it is about love, not gifts.”

The bride-to-be said that for her and Masci, marriage is sacred, and the sacrament is important both for them and their families.

Masci said, “It’s not easy to find someone with the same values in a small town; I had to go across the ocean.” The two met in Greece.

The ages of the engaged couples participating in the Mass approximated the general statistics for Italy, with very few under 30 and several over 40. The average age for marriage in Italy is 34 years for men and 31 years for women, according to figures released late in 2012 by Istat, the government’s national statistics office.

As the couples sipped coffee in the frigid morning air waiting for Mass to begin, Archbishop Paglia greeted them, one by one, asking where they were from and thanking them for coming.

He told reporters, “St. Valentine is celebrated from Cairo to Tokyo” and, even if most people exchanging flowers, cards and chocolates don’t understand love the way the church does, “it is important to recognize this spark of love and make it stronger.”

In his homily, he told the young couples that if they, like many of their peers, thought it really was impossible for a man and woman to be married and love each other for life, then they would not have come to the promise Mass. But the fact that they are asking St. Valentine’s protection and assistance, he said, means they recognize how difficult it may be to be faithful and loving forever.

“I see the affection in your eyes,” he told the couples, “but I also see an awareness that it won’t always be easy.”

Archbishop Paglia told them the key to marriage and family life is to spend time together, to talk, to try to understand each other and, especially, to be willing to forgive one another.

“Do not forget to go to Mass on Sundays,” he told them, “because if you are connected to others, your love will be stronger and your children will be stronger.”

The archbishop ended his homily by telling the couples, “The choice to marry and love each other forever seems like an empty promise to many people, but you know that is the meaning of real love.”

By Catholic News Service

A Catholic News Service report in 2010 described Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the hometown of a pope who resigned, St. Celestine V. During the July 4, 2010 trip to Sulmona, Italy, the pope did not emphasize the fact Celestine resigned the papacy.

Below is the original report.

 SULMONA, Italy— The life of a 13th-century monk who became pope should be an inspiration for contemporary people living in a society of materialistic excess and false values, Pope Benedict XVI said.

Pope Benedict XVI visits the crypt containing relics of St. Celestine V, a 13th-century pope who resigned, during his pastoral visit to the late pope’s hometown of Sulmona, Italy, on July 4, 2010. (CNS file)

The German pope honored the birth 800 years ago of St. Celestine V in his hometown of Sulmona, Italy, in a Mass and meetings with local residents and young people July 4.

St. Celestine, who lived 1209-1296, is best known for being the last pope known to have given up the throne of Peter. He abdicated in 1294 after only four months in office and has been known through history as a holy man who rejected the political machinations of the medieval papacy.

Pope Benedict chose not to emphasize St. Celestine’s short tenure as pontiff, but rather the importance of both the inner and outward silence that allowed him “to perceive the voice of God, which guided his life.”

The pope acknowledged the difficulties faced by residents of the small city of Sulmona, which was seriously affected by the April 2009 earthquake in nearby L’Aquila. He encouraged them to take heart and example from St. Celestine in gathering strength and perceiving the needs of others.

“We live today in a society in which every space, every moment must be ‘filled’ with initiatives, activities and sound,” so that there is no time for listening and dialogue, the pope said.

“Dear brothers and sisters, don’t be afraid of silence outside and inside ourselves, if we want to hear not only the voice of God but also of those who are close to us, the voices of others,” he said.

In a meeting with young Catholics from the area, the pope warned of the false promise of the “current consumer culture” which he said ignores the lessons of the past and “takes away the ability to understand, perceive problems, build for tomorrow.”

Young people searching for answers and guidance should look to St. Celestine to understand the importance and beauty of “living moments of interior silence” in order to “learn to listen to the voice of the Lord,” Pope Benedict said.

He told the young people that while faith and prayer don’t directly resolve problems, “they allow us to face them with light and a new strength.” Studying the lives of the saints shows that by turning to God, creative solutions to concrete problems become evident, he said.

The pope said people might be inclined to think that St. Celestine and others like him who cut themselves off from the world to be closer to God are excessively individualistic or are escaping responsibility. But the church believes that the solitary life of prayer and penitence is always at the service of the community and that monasteries and hermitages are “oases and sources of life from which all can benefit,” he said.

He reminded the young people that St. Celestine held nature and creation in great respect and that they should do the same.

The pope arrived in a helicopter and flew over the mountainous area where St. Celestine spent his years in solitary contemplation, including the Hermitage of St. Onofrio, where word that he had been elected pope reached him in 1294.

By USCCB

WASHINGTON — Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued this statement after learning of the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI:

A television reporter does a standup in front of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican Feb. 11 after the announcement that Pope Benedict XVI will resign Feb. 28. The 85-year-old pontiff said he no longer has the energy to exercise his ministry over the universal church. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

“The Holy Father brought the tender heart of a pastor, the incisive mind of a scholar and the confidence of a soul united with his God in all he did. His resignation is but another sign of his great care for the church. We are sad that he will be resigning but grateful for his eight years of selfless leadership as successor of St. Peter.

“Though 78 when he elected pope in 2005, he set out to meet his people – and they were of all faiths – all over the world. He visited the religiously threatened – Jews, Muslims and Christians in the war-torn Middle East, the desperately poor in Africa, and the world’s youth gathered to meet him in Australia, Germany, Spain and Brazil.

He delighted our beloved United States of America when he visited Washington and New York in 2008. As a favored statesman he greeted notables at the White House. As a spiritual leader he led the Catholic community in prayer at Nationals Park, Yankee Stadium and St. Patrick’s Cathedral. As a pastor feeling pain in a stirring, private meeting at the Vatican nunciature in Washington, he brought a listening heart to victims of sexual abuse by clerics.

“Pope Benedict often cited the significance of eternal truths and he warned of a dictatorship of relativism. Some values, such as human life, stand out above all others, he taught again and again. It is a message for eternity.

“He unified Catholics and reached out to schismatic groups in hopes of drawing them back to the church. More unites us than divides us, he said by word and deed. That message is for eternity.

“He spoke for the world’s poor when he visited them and wrote of equality among nations in his peace messages and encyclicals. He pleaded for a more equitable share of world resources and for a respect for God’s creation in nature.

“Those who met him, heard him speak and read his clear, profound writings found themselves moved and changed. In all he said and did he urged people everywhere to know and have a personal encounter with Jesus Christ.

“The occasion of his resignation stands as an important moment in our lives as citizens of the world. Our experience impels us to thank God for the gift of Pope Benedict. Our hope impels us to pray that the College of Cardinals under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit choose a worthy successor to meet the challenges present in today’s world.”

By Dennis Sadowski

Catholic News Service

Pope Benedict XVI’s announcement that he planned to resign Feb. 28 stunned and shocked religious leaders around the world.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien of St. Andrews and Edinburgh, Scotland, said he was “shocked and saddened” to hear of the pope’s decision Feb. 11.

Pope Benedict XVI greets the faithful after delivering a talk at the conclusion of a Mass for the Knights of Malta in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican Feb. 9. The pope announced Feb. 11 that he will resign at the end of the month. The 85-year-old pontiff said he no longer has the energy to exercise his ministry over the universal church. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

“I know that his decision will have been considered most carefully and that it has come after much prayer and reflection,” Cardinal O’Brien said.

He offered prayers from the Scottish church for Pope Benedict “at this time of deterioration in his health as he recognizes his incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to him.”

Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster, England, president of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, said the pope’s announcement “has shocked and surprised everyone.”

“Yet, on reflection, I am sure that many will recognize it to be a decision of great courage and characteristic clarity of mind and action,” Archbishop Nichols said.

“The Holy Father recognizes the challenges facing the church and that ‘strength of mind and body are necessary’ for his tasks of governing the church and proclaiming the Gospel.

“I salute his courage and his decision,” he added.

Anglican Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury said he learned of Pope Benedict’s resignation with a “heavy heart but complete understanding.” He offered thanks for the pope’s priestly life “utterly dedicated in word and deed, in prayer and in costly service to following Christ.”

“He has laid before us something of the meaning of the Petrine ministry of building up the people of God to full maturity,” Archbishop Welby said.

The Anglican archbishop credited the pope for his “witness to the universal scope of the Gospel and a messenger of hope at a time when Christian faith is being called into question.” He cited Pope Benedict’s teaching and writing for bringing a “remarkable and creative theological mind to bear on the issues of the day.”

“We who belong to other Christian families gladly acknowledge the importance of this witness and join with our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters in thanking God for the inspiration and challenge of Pope Benedict’s ministry,” Archbishop Welby added.

In Turkey, Msgr. Louis Pelatre, apostolic vicar of Istanbul, expressed surprise at Pope Benedict’s the decision, telling Catholic News Service “no one expected this, even those very close to him. But we pray and go forward.”

“It was his personal decision. No one can influence him. We are no longer in a world where one can stay in the same position if he no longer feels he is no longer capable of fulfilling his duties. He was very tired. We know that and we saw that,’ Msgr. Pelatre said.

Contributing to this story were Simon Caldwell in Manchester, England, and James Martone in Istanbul, Turkey.