Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Cardinals begin on Benedict successor

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTVajIETQMaxu7HNXZ3aeL4d0vVijIpixAaTvzwQ9HxT0RPioRoCardinals have begun informal contacts to discuss who should next lead the Catholic Church through a period of major crisis as the Vatican said it planned a big send-off for Pope Benedict XVI before he became the first pontiff in centuries to resign.

At a news conference on how the Pope plans to spend the next two weeks before he steps out of the limelight, the Vatican also disclosed that he had been wearing a pacemaker since before he was elected in 2005.

It said no specific illness led the 85-year-old to resign, merely old age and diminishing mental and physical strength.

It also said he would not play any role in the running of the Church after his Feb 28 resignation.

“The Pope has said in his declaration that he will use his time for prayer and reflection and will not have any responsibility for guidance of the Church or any administrative or government responsibility,” said Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi.

“This is absolutely clear and this is the sense of the resignation,” he said, adding that he would “not intervene in any way” in trying to influence the choice of his successor.

The Vatican has changed venues of some papal activities so more people can see him before the resignation. Today, the Pope was to have led an Ash Wednesday service at a small church in Rome but the event has been moved to St Peter’s Basilica for what will likely be his last Mass in public.

His last general audience, scheduled for the day before his resignation, has moved from the Vatican’s audience hall, which has a capacity of 10,000 people, to St Peter’s Square, which can hold hundreds of thousands.

After he leaves office, he will go first to the papal summer residence south of Rome and then to a cloistered convent inside the Vatican walls.

In mid-March, about 115 cardinals will enter the Sistine Chapel to elect the next leader of the world’s 1.2bn Roman Catholics.

After a string of scandals, Church experts say cardinals will be looking for someone who is not only holy but a good administrator.

“A lot of cardinals will tell you off the record if you ask them for their private assessment of this pope that personally he was a great man, holy, genuine, honest, and humble and that his teachings will stand the test of time,” said John Allen, author of several books on the Vatican.

“But they will also say that there was a regime around Benedict XVI that did not know how to make the trains run on time and they were often left to pick up the pieces of bombs that exploded here.”

Speculation has grown that the Church could appoint its first non-European leader to reflect the growing weight of regions such as Africa or Latin America, which account for 42% of the world’s Catholics.