News - Pope's Resignation: Shock, disbelief trail decision

[TGD]

MORE reactions on Monday greeted Pope Benedict XVI's announcement that he will resign later this month as Catholic faithful in St. Peter's Square reacted with amazement and emotion over the decision.

Hundreds of believers converged on the heart of the Roman Catholic Church after hearing the historic news, swelling the usual small huddles of tourists on an overcast and chilly winter day in Rome.

"I love Benedict. We're really shocked he's resigning because he wasn't pope for long enough," said Sebastian Mazur, a seminarian from Poland.

"He hasn't finished his plan," the 21-year-old said.

Father Aaron Melancon, a 43-year-old priest from the United States (U.S.), said: "The news is quite shocking. We have love and affection for Pope Benedict. I loved his writing as a cardinal and as a pope. I loved the leadership under him."

"He is the second pope in history to break the tradition and I am not in favour of this decision, but it is his own," Melancon said.

Marta, a 38-year-old Spaniard on holiday in Rome with her husband, said: "It's a really bad thing."

"He should have stayed for life, you can't just leave when you want to," she said.

Jennifer, 30, from Colorado in the U.S., said: "I was really shocked. In our media-dominated culture, It's a unique challenge for the pope to be so available constantly so if he has lost some of his faculties, I guess he's done the right thing.

"It's sadder today than when pope John Paul II died because at least that was natural," she said.

Others were more critical of Benedict's pontificate.

"I wasn't his biggest fan even though I'm German," said Eric, a 40-year-old tourist.

"It's an interesting time to resign, what with the child abuse scandal, I wonder if it was all just too much for him?"

Bart Vanhatten, 20, an Erasmus exchange student also from Germany, said: "I didn't like him at all. I expected more from him, especially on homointercourseuality. I hope the next pope will be more progressive."

Dorina, a 22-year-old Swiss woman on holiday, was equally hopeful for change in the Church.

"I hope that the next pope will be black, that would really make mentalities evolve," she said.

World Council of Churches lauds Pope

THE World Council of Churches said it has accepted the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI.

The Council's general secretary, Rev. Olav Fykse Tveit, in a statement made available to The Guardian expressed his appreciation for the Pope's love and commitment to the Church and to the ecumenical movement.

"We have to respect the decision of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to resign," Tveit said from New York yesterday where he is visiting the WCC office, adding "With deep respect I have seen how he has carried the responsibility and burden of his ministry in his advanced age, in a very demanding time for the church."

He prayed God to bless the Pope in this moment and this phase of his life. In addition, the Council asked   God to guide and bless the Roman Catholic Church in a very important time of transition.

Tveit said Pope Benedict knew the WCC well, referring to the time in the late 1960s and early 1970s when as a Professor of Theology at the University of Tuebingen, Germany, he was a member of the WCC Faith and Order Commission.

'He promised a lot, but delivered nothing'

A GROUP representing victims of child abuse in Catholic-run institutions in Ireland yesterday welcomed the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI after "he promised a lot but delivered nothing."

Also, an Australian group representing the victims of intercourseual abuse has okayed Pope Benedict XVI's resignation, saying he had done little to stop "the reign of terror of child rapist priests," a report said.

"This pope had a great opportunity to finally address the decades of abuse in the church but at the end of the day he did nothing but promise everything and in the end he ultimately delivered nothing," John Kelly, of the Survivors of Child Abuse support group in Ireland, told Agence France Presse (AFP).

Ireland has been stunned by a series of revealing reports in recent years that lifted the lid on decades of child abuse suffered at the hands of religious members that stretches back to the foundation of the state in 1922.

"We asked the pope for sanctions against the religious orders who committed the abuse and the religious leaders in Ireland who allowed this to happen but to our dismay nothing has happened," Kelly added.

Kelly himself spent most of his childhood living in Catholic-run institutions and recalls being flogged with a whip and having a religious brother standing on his hands.

Groups such as Survivors of Child Abuse have repeatedly called on the Vatican to bring to justice priests found to have carried out abuse.

"The Church needs to acknowledge that all of this happened. They need to acknowledge that they allowed the devil inside and had him reside there for 50 years," Kelly said.

"The Church cannot move on. This pope's tenure has been plagued by scandals and that will continue unless the pope addresses the root causes and that can only start from the top."

Catholic secretariat, CAN, others hail action

CHRISTIANS in Nigeria yesterday reacted to Pope Benedict XVI plan to resign on February 28, 2013 as Director, Communications, Catholic Secretariat of Nigeria, Rev. Fr Ralph Madu, said the decision came to them as a surprise.

In the same vein, the President of Christian Association of Nigeria, (CAN) Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, said the pope's resignation was shocking to them, as he had impacted positively on the Catholic Church and the Christendom in general.

Also, Archbishop of Lagos, His Grace, Most Rev. Alfred Adewale Martins said: "It came as a surprise to me that the pope plans to resign. Nobody was expecting it. However, he is the only one who knows himself. He knows the state of his health. He knows how he is feeling when he wakes up in the morning. If he has examined his mind and he is at peace with his conscience. I think its good for him and the church in general."

Madu told The Guardian that the pope felt that his health was deteriorating and he needed strength of mind and body to carry out his duties of being the leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics worldwide.

He noted that the Pope's resignation was not against the law of the Cannon 332, part 2, that says the pope was free to resign and the resignation should be fully manifest, that is he should be able to openly declare his intention without allowing people to speculate.

While advising Nigerian leaders to take a cue from the actions of the pope, he said, "this is a lesson to all of us, especially sit- tight leaders not to wait till their health completely deteriorates before stepping down from office."

In a statement by his Media Adviser, Mr. Kenny Ashaka, Oritsejafor prayed that the Catholic Church would have a successor that would match his positive attributes and carry on with his reforms and sustain the enviable Roman Catholic doctrine.

The Guardian