Former Pope Benedict, hero of Catholic Conservatives, dies by Health & Fitness Journal

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©Health & Fitness Journal. FILE PHOTO: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. waves as he arrives to attend a beatification mass for former Pope Paul VI. in St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican on October 19, 2014. REUTERS/Tony Gentile/File Photo 2/3

By Philip Pullella and Crispian Balmer

VATICAN CITY (Health & Fitness Journal) – Former Pope Benedict, the first pope to resign in 600 years and a standard-bearer for conservatives yearning for a more traditional church, died on Saturday, ending an extraordinary period in which two men in white lived in the Vatican.

Benedict, 95, died in a former convent where he had lived since resigning in 2013.

In his first public comment after his death, Pope Francis said the Church and the world had lost a noble, gentle man.

Bells rang in Rome as news of his death, which followed a rapid decline in his health over Christmas, spread to the faithful on an unseasonably warm winter’s day. Upon hearing the news, many went to St. Peter’s Square to pray.

“Now we will only have one pope. I have to say that Pope Ratzinger was a charismatic pope, humble but above all a great theologian,” said French tourist Emilie Gaillard, using Benedict’s surname.

The Vatican said his body would be laid out in St. Peter’s Basilica from Monday and that Pope Francis would preside at his funeral Thursday morning in the same square where Benedict, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, held the funeral mass for his predecessor. Pope John Paul II, 2005.

“It is with sadness that I inform you that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. died today at 9:34 a.m. at the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican,” said Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni.

“At the request of the Pope Emeritus, the funeral will be held in a spirit of simplicity,” Bruni said, adding that the service would be “solemn and sober.”

The Vatican has elaborate rituals for what happens after the death of an incumbent pope, but none publicly known for a former pope – one of the many complications created by Benedict’s resignation.

The Vatican said official government delegations at the funeral would be limited to those from Germany and Italy. Other dignitaries could attend in a private capacity.

Pope Francis announced on Wednesday that his predecessor was “very ill”. Bruni said Benedict received the last rites, once known as the Last Rites and now called the Anointing of the Sick, on the same day.

The leaders quickly sent their condolences to Benedict, who was the first German pope in 1,000 years.

“We mourn our Bavarian Pope,” said Markus Söder, Prime Minister of Benedict’s home state. Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Twitter that the world had lost “a defining figure in the Catholic Church”.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni praised Benedict as “a great man whom history will not forget”, while Polish President Andrzej Duda called him “one of the greatest theologians of the 20th and 21st centuries”.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Benedict “worked with all his soul and intelligence for a more fraternal world”.

Britain’s King Charles said he fondly remembers his meeting with Benedict, noting “his constant efforts to promote peace and goodwill for all people and to strengthen the relationship between the global Anglican communion and the Roman Catholic Church”.

SCANDALS AND LEAKS

As Cardinal Ratzinger, Benedict was the powerful head of the Vatican Magisterium, then known as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), for almost 25 years and was considered one of the Church’s greatest theologians.

In this role, he crushed the dissent of liberation theologians by saying they were mixing Marxist thought and Christianity.

He was elected Pope on April 19, 2005, succeeding the widely popular Pope John Paul, who had reigned for 27 years. Cardinals chose him from their midst in search of continuity and what has been called “a sure pair of hands.”

Child abuse scandals dogged most of his papacy, but he is credited with initiating the process of disciplining or firing robber priests after a more lax stance under his predecessor.

But Benedict himself acknowledged he was a weak administrator, saying he experienced a “lack of determination in governing and making decisions during an eight-year papacy marked by missteps, particularly in relations with Islam and Judaism ” shown.

The year leading up to his resignation was marked by the “Vatileaks” scandal, in which private papal documents surfaced in the media, revealing a dysfunctional Vatican torn by internal strife, corruption and feuds.

TWO “PONES”, ONE VATICAN

He announced his resignation in Latin at a routine meeting of cardinals. Many had no idea what he had said and it took some time for the message to penetrate. He himself said he was no longer strong enough to lead the church because of his “advanced age”.

After resigning, he settled in a converted convent on Vatican grounds and chose the title of Pope Emeritus.

Although he said that he would remain “hidden from the world” in his retirement, Benedict sometimes stirred controversy and spread confusion through his writings and interviews.

Though he rarely appeared in public, Catholic conservatives considered the former pope their standard-bearer, and some ultra-traditionalists even refused to recognize Francis as the legitimate pope.

They have criticized Francis for his friendlier approach to members of the LGBTQ+ community and to Catholics who divorced and remarried outside the church, saying both undermine traditional values.

Despite the difficulties posed by two men wearing white at the Vatican, Francis developed a warm relationship with Benedict, saying it was like having a grandfather living in the house.