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10 Gulf Pine Catholic • January 20, 2023 In the book, Pope Benedict insisted once again that he was not pressured by anyone or any event to resign and he did not feel he was running away from any prob- lem. However, he acknowledged “practical governance was not my forte, and this certainly was a weakness.” Insisting “my hour had passed, and I had given all I could,” Pope Benedict said he never regretted resign- ing, but he did regret hurting friends and faithful who were “really distressed and felt forsaken” by his step- ping down. Less than a month after resigning, he already looked frailer and walked with noticeably more difficulty than he did when he left office. The video images released by the Vatican March 23, 2013, when his successor, Pope Francis, visited him at Castel Gandolfo under- scored the “diminishing energy” Pope Benedict had said led to his resignation. Pope Benedict moved to the papal summer villa at Castel Gandolfo Feb. 28, 2013, the day his resignation took effect. He remained at the villa south of Rome for two months -- a period that included the conclave that elected Pope Francis as his successor and the first month of the new pope’s pontificate. The retired pope moved back to the Vatican May 2, 2013, living in a monastery remodeled as a residence for him, his secre- tary and the consecrated women who cared for his household before and after his resignation. On his only post-retirement trip outside of Italy, he flew to Germany in June 2020 for a five-day visit with his ailing 96-year-old brother. Answering questions from reporters on a flight back from Brazil in July 2013, Pope Francis spoke with admiration of the retired pope’s humility, intelligence and prayerfulness. The unusual situation of having a pope and a retired pope both living at the Vatican was working out very well, Pope Francis said. Having the retired pope nearby to consult with, or ask questions of, Pope Francis said, was “like having a grandfather at home -- a very wise grandfather.” By the time Pope Benedict had been retired for a year, his daily routine was set. Archbishop Georg Ganswein, his personal secretary, said his days began with Mass, morning prayer and breakfast. Although mostly hidden from public view, he was not cloistered, but continued welcoming old friends and colleagues, engaging in dialogue or offering spiritual counsel. He spent hours reading and dealing with correspondence before a 4 p.m. stroll in the garden and recitation of the rosary. In the early days of his retirement, to the delight and surprise of pilgrims and cardinals, Pope Benedict appeared at major events with Pope Francis, including the opening of the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica Dec. 8, 2015. At a June 2016 celebration in the Apostolic Palace, where Pope Benedict once lived and worked, Pope Francis, top officials of the Roman Curia and a few friends gathered with him to mark the 65th anniversary of the retired pontiff’s priestly ordination. Pope Francis told Pope Benedict that with him in residence, the monastery in the Vatican Gardens “ema- nates tranquility, peace, strength, faithfulness, maturity, Obit Benedict From page 1 faith, dedication and loyalty, which does so much good for me and gives strength to me and to the whole church.” Pope Benedict replied to Pope Francis, “More than the beauty found in the Vatican Gardens, your goodness is the place where I live; I feel protected.” He prayed that Pope Francis would continue to “lead us all on this path of divine mercy that shows the path of Jesus, to Jesus and to God.” Mercy was a prominent topic in an interview Pope Benedict gave in 2015. The Catholic focus on mercy really began with St. John Paul, the retired pope told Belgian Jesuit Father Jacques Servais in the written interview, which was not released until March 2016. From his experience as a youth during World War II and his ministry under communism in Poland, St. John Paul “affirmed that mercy is the only true and ulti- mately effective reaction against the power of evil. Only where there is mercy does cruelty end, only there do evil and violence stop,” said Pope Benedict, who worked closely with the Polish pope for decades. “Pope Francis,” he said, “is in complete agreement with this line. His pastoral practice is expressed pre- cisely in the fact that he speaks continuously of God’s mercy.” Pope Benedict had said he planned to live a “hidden life” in retirement -- and to a large extent he did. But when he did make contributions to public discussions, they became headline news. In April 2019, for instance, what he described as “notes” on the clerical sexual abuse crisis were published; and, in January 2020, an essay he wrote on priestly celibacy was published in a book by Cardinal Robert Sarah, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments. In the text on abuse, which the retired pope said was motivated by the February 2019 Vatican summit on the crisis, Pope Benedict traced the abuse crisis to a loss of certainty about faith and morals, especially beginning in the late 1960s. To address the crisis, he wrote, “what is required first and foremost is the renewal of the faith in the reality of Jesus Christ given to us in the Blessed Sacrament.” The 2020 text on celibacy became the center of a media storm, not only because of its content, but also because Catholics were awaiting Pope Francis’ official response to the Synod of Bishops for the Amazon and suggestions made there that in remote areas the church could consider ordaining some married men to take the sacraments to Catholics who usually go months with- out. Since marriage and priesthood both demand the total devotion and self-giving of a man to his vocation, “it does not seem possible to realize both vocations simultaneously,” Pope Benedict wrote in his essay. The retired pope’s contribution to the discussion became even more controversial when Archbishop Ganswein informed media and the original publisher that while Pope Benedict contributed an essay to Cardinal Sarah’s book, he did not want to be listed as co-author of the volume. As inevitable as his election seemed after St. John Paul died in 2005, Pope Benedict’s path to the papacy was long and indirect. Joseph Ratzinger was born April 16, 1927, in the Bavarian town of Marktl am Inn, the third and youngest child of a police officer, Joseph Sr., and his wife, Maria. Young Joseph joined his brother, Georg, at a minor seminary in 1939. Like other young students in Germany at the time, he was automatically enrolled in the Hitler Youth pro- gram, but soon stopped going to meetings. During World War II, he was conscripted into the army, and in the spring of 1945, he deserted his unit and returned home, spending a few months in an Allied prisoner-of- war camp. He returned to the seminary late in 1945 and was ordained six years later, along with his brother. In a meeting with young people in 2006, the pope said witnessing the brutality of the Nazi regime helped persuade him to become a priest. But he also had to overcome some doubts, he said. For one thing, he asked himself whether he “could faithfully live celibacy” his entire life. He also recognized that his real leanings were toward theology and wondered whether he had the qualities of a good pastor and the ability “to be simple with the simple people.” After a short stint as a parish priest, the future pope began a teaching career and built a reputation as one of the church’s foremost theologians. At Vatican II, he made important contributions as a theological expert and embraced the council’s early work. But he began to have misgivings about an emerging anti-Roman bias, the idea of a “church from below” run on a parliamen- tary model, and the direction of theological research in the church -- criticism that would become even sharper in later years. SEE OBIT BENEFICT, PAGE 21 Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger greets Pope John Paul II upon the pontiff’s arrival to West Germany in 1980. Pope Benedict died Dec. 31, 2022, at the age of 95 in his residence at the Vatican. CNS photo