After Pledging Loyalty to Successor, Pope Leaves Vatican

VATICAN CITY — In his final hours as head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI met on Thursday with the cardinals who will elect his successor, urging them to be “like an orchestra” that harmonizes for the good of the church and pledging that he would behave with “unconditional reverence and obedience” toward his successor.


It was one of the concluding acts of a nearly eight-year, scandal-dogged papacy that, Benedict said on Wednesday, was filled with “light and joy” but also had its darker moments when “the Lord seemed to be sleeping.”

A day after blessing the faithful for the last time as pope, Benedict will leave the Vatican by helicopter on Thursday for the papal summer residence and his retirement will formally take effect at 8 p.m., when he will become the “pope emeritus.”

After thanking the more than 100 cardinals collectively from a gilded throne in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace, the pope rose and greeted each of them individually.

Draped in a red and gold mantle lined with snow-white ermine, Benedict clasped the cardinals’ hands as they removed their distinctive red skullcaps to greet him and kiss his ring.

Benedict told them, “I will be close to you in prayer” as they meet in coming days to choose his successor from their ranks.

“Among you is also the future pope, whom I promise my unconditional reverence and obedience,” Benedict told the cardinals, reflecting the concern among Vatican watchers about what it will mean to have two popes residing in the Vatican.

Benedict will initially reside in Castel Gandolfo, a hilltop town outside Rome where popes have summered for centuries. He is expected to stay there for several months before returning to live at the Vatican in a convent whose gardens offer a perfect view of the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica.

Many of the cardinals who lined up to bid farewell to Benedict had been appointed to their powerful positions as so-called princes of the church by him or his predecessor, John Paul II, and are thus seen as followers of his doctrinal conservatism.

Benedict shocked the world on Feb. 11 when he announced that, feeling his age and diminishing strength, he would retire, a dramatic step that sent the members of the Vatican hierarchy into a tailspin. He reassured the faithful on Sunday that he was not “abandoning” the church, but would continue to serve, even in retirement.

In an emotional and unusually personal message on Wednesday, his final public audience in St. Peter’s Square, Benedict said that sometimes he felt that “the waters were agitated and the winds were blowing against” the church. His retirement will bring changes in style and substance.

In comparison to the heavy ornate robes he wore to greet the cardinals, Benedict will don a white cassock and brown shoes from Mexico, replacing the red slippers that he and other popes have traditionally worn, the color symbolizing the blood of the martyrs.

The conclave to elect the next pope, which is expected to start by mid-March, will begin amid a swirl of scandal. On Monday, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, Britain’s senior Roman Catholic cleric said that he would not participate in the conclave, after having been accused of “inappropriate acts” with several priests, charges that he denies. Other cardinals have also come under fire in sexual abuse scandals, but only Cardinal O’Brien has recused himself.

On Monday, Benedict met with three cardinals he had asked to conduct an investigation into the “VatiLeaks” scandal in which hundreds of confidential documents were leaked to the press and published in a tell-all book last May, the worst security breach in the church’s modern history. The three cardinals compiled a hefty dossier on the scandal, which Benedict has entrusted only to his successor, not to the cardinals entering the conclave, the Vatican spokesman said earlier this week.

On Thursday, Panorama, a weekly magazine, reported that the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, had been conducting his own investigation into the leaks scandal, including requesting wiretaps on the phones of some members of the Vatican hierarchy. That would be taking a page from the playbook of magistrates in Italy, where wiretaps are extensive.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said on Thursday that in the context of an investigation into the leaks, magistrates of the Vatican, not the Secretariat of State, “might have authorized some wiretaps or some checks” but nothing on a significant scale. The idea of “an investigation that creates an atmosphere of fear of mistrust that will now affect the conclave has no foundation in reality.” A shy theologian who appeared to have little interest in the internal politics of the Vatican, Benedict has said that he is retiring “freely, and for the good of the church,” entrusting it to a successor who has more strength than he. But shadows linger. The next pope will inherit a hierarchy buffeted by crises of governance as well as power struggles over the Vatican Bank, which has struggled to conform to international transparency norms.

Many faithful have welcomed Benedict’s gesture as a sign of humility and humanity, a rational decision taken by a man who no longer feels up to the job.

As he stood near St. Peter’s Square on Wednesday after attending the pope’s last public audience, Vincenzo Petrucci, 26, said he had come to express “not so much solidarity, but more like closeness” to the pope. “At first we felt astonished, shocked and disoriented,” he said. “But then we saw what a weighty decision it must have been. He seemed almost lonely.”

Many in the Vatican hierarchy, known as the Roman Curia, are still reeling from the news. Many are bereaved and others seem almost angry. “We are terribly, terribly, terribly shocked,” one senior Vatican official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/01/world/europe/pope-benedict-xvi.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Pope Benedict XVI: 'Thank You And Good Night'
http://news.sky.com/story/1058324/pope-benedict-xvi-thank-you-and-good-night


Comment:
We have addressed certain Seychellois Christian Family about our situation for the past four years and requesting their prayers and support. Equally in Islington three Catholic church and the Parish of St Paul by Knight Bridge.

Since multi party return the many new Churches, Renovations in Seychelles.

We have been writing that that SIROP program was not a military program - but driven by those who believe in the power of Faith, greater Powers, the changes in the COMECON early start, changes in the USSR, then the Indian Ocean, Africa. China. The involvement of the WWW and what we have written about - why the WWW was put together in the first place. Those from all the Christain church who choose and pretend, Then Pope John Paul ll, the issues that was shared, conveyed and presented to him and his Office at the time about the WWW project. . our person did/do not exist and yet the very important impacts and benefit of the WWW in the Christian Church today, Family and Society.

Yet those who/from the Commonwealth have hijack Wikipedia to state they changed Seychelles One Party System/Communist - the fate of those 21,000 Seychellois exile/refugees.

There are those in the Vatican - Rome and Italy well aware of what we are writing about. It is very sad when politicians - particularly a person like President JA Michel with all his Police, international police connections, diplomatic - get to hijack Church, christian and Faith issues as/like he does and is doing with politic - He ought to have been very aware the respective role of Pope Benedict to then Pope John Paul ll.

Just as we have that International Pirate Center opened in the Seychelles for Somalia and the Prison - for those 21,000 Seychellois exile/refugee they are use as milking cows, football, creaming machine etc. This situation need never have come about.

There are very complex and complicated issues - the important contacts we had with Rome Representation in London for that SIROP program in private, just as we have addressed the issues of the building of St Peter basilica in Africa and the building of Opus Dei in the State - those who choose to ignore.

In Greater EU, Commission, Parliament, Council 2012 amidst the mega turmoil, their respective view - the EU must be prepared to work with new dynamics, synergies and set of individuals as against those who changed and made Europe what it is today.

Equally those who had stated to our person we would not live to see the coming to Office of the next Shepherd/Father of the Church of Rome - there has been a great deal of praying since Autumn 2012 and to date. Had this been a Blair government or Lady Thacher what would have happened/occur in the greater nations and diplomatic world if at the next Conclave of Cardinal there was not a British Cardinal.

It is very late and too late now - just in case those Catholic concern, those from British politic concern. Which is more important the Somali pirate or that SIROP program, which brought changes in Catholic faith in the COMECON, the USSR and China and those with their corrupted benchmark, corrupted practice and media workings - where we have landed/arrived today.

The search and election of the next Head of Rome - the Vatican and the Catholic church for those who really know more serious and important world issues gravely important - when Pope John Paul ll was alive we have a better working relation with his Office and the Vatican, all those who know this - we have addressed the many German leading politicians including chancellor Merkle and their respective position. . We do know our forums and Blog is monitored.

We do trust and hope those of you in Seychelles very dedicated and concern about the situation, society, the Family life and events - those who know the state of their Faith when changes came to then Seychelles - they/we need to pray more than ever. The world/church do not need a Pope with the mechanism of New Labour which infested the world and Humanity - what we have been writing - by the way we have read part of PM Blair book only last week. Just in the form of Pope John Paul ll we had a great global christian movement, development, human aspiration - the world need a Head it church who can take the challenge and bring solution - the scientific communities, the politicians, the media and the many respective global institutions cannot bring and deliver.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opus_Dei