Pope's brother says Benedict won't return home

BERLIN (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI's brother says he spoke with the pontiff after his surprise announcement that he was stepping down and that the 85-year-old is not planning on moving back to his German homeland after his retirement.

Georg Ratzinger, the pope's 89-year-old brother, said Tuesday that it made more sense for Benedict to stay in the Vatican.

"You don't transplant an old tree," Ratzinger told a small group of reporters at his home in Regensburg, a small city in southern Germany.

Ratzinger says his brother intends to lead a quiet life out of the public eye, and wasn't planning on publishing any more works.

He says "I don't think he will write anymore."

Ratzinger says he's already planning a visit to go see his brother later in the year.

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Latin-loving pope uses ancient language to quit

ROME (Reuters) - Pope Benedict announced his historic decision to resign on Monday in an address to cardinals which he delivered in Latin, the ancient tongue whose use he had done much to encourage.

"Quapropter bene conscius ponderis huius actus plena libertate declaro me ministerio Episcopi Romae, Successoris Sancti Petri, mihi per manus Cardinalium die 19 aprilis MMV commissum renuntiare," he said during a meeting on naming new saints.

The Vatican provided a translation: "Well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me by the Cardinals on 19 April 2005."

Pope Benedict, known for his traditionalist leanings, is the latest in a string of modern-day popes to encourage a revival of Latin, the language which gave rise to Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and Romanian.

Last year he launched a new Vatican department to promote the study and use of Latin in the Roman Catholic Church and beyond. He has also allowed a partial return of the old-style Latin mass that was phased out more than four decades ago.

He launched a Latin Twitter account this year, tweeting in the official language of the Catholic Church for the first time in January.

His efforts followed similar attempts by predecessors. In 1962, Pope John XXIII published "Veterum Sapientia", a document aimed at promoting the study of Latin, and in 1976 Pope Paul VI started the Latin Foundation and its quarterly "Latinitas".

(Reporting By Catherine Hornby; Editing by Peter Graff)

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Fantino defends Uganda grants policy against religious, anti-gay claims

OTTAWA - International Co-operation Minister Julian Fantino is defending the way Canada hands out money for development projects abroad.

He's under fire in the House of Commons following a Canadian Press report that funding went to an evangelical group that has described homosexuality as a perversion.

Ontario-based Crossroads Christian Communications, which produces television programs, received $544,813 in federal money to help dig wells, build latrines and promote hygiene awareness in Uganda through 2014.

Uganda has been shaken by virulent homophobia in the past and Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird has condemned plans for an anti-gay bill there that could potentially include the death penalty for homosexuals.

Crossroads recently described homosexuality as a perversion and a sin on its website, although the post disappeared after the group was contacted about it.

Fantino tells the Commons that projects are financed based on results, not religion.

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Law allowing guns in churches signed by Arkansas governor

(Reuters) - Big-spending Cleveland Indians continued their bold off-season by acquiring free agent outfielder Michael Bourn, the team said on Monday. Bourn, who was an All Star for the Atlanta Braves last season, has agreed to a four-year deal worth $48 million, according to local reports, to join the American League pending his physical. The deal is just the latest splash by the Indians who have also hired manager Terry Francona and picked up free agent Nick Swisher. ...

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Latin America would like a Latin pope, odds slim

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Latin America is home to the world's largest Roman Catholic population, but hopes that the next pope will come from the region appear faint, experts said Monday.

The predominance of Europeans on the College of Cardinals means that the odds are stacked against a Latin American pope, even though the names of a number of high-ranking churchmen from the region have been bandied about, analysts said. The 118-member college, with 62 European members and only 19 from Latin America, will elect a successor for Pope Benedict XVI, who announced Monday he will resign due to age.

Still, hope springs eternal.

"Since Latin America is a fortress for Christianity during these rough times, it would be healthy for us to get a Latin American pope," said Fernando Reyes, 57, a professional violinist, who prays daily at the La Merced church in Santiago, Chile.

Crossing himself before leaving the church, Reyes noted, "I would be proud. We've had Italian, Polish, German. It's time for a Latin American."

Brazilian Cardinals Joao Braz de Aviz, a 65-year-old who has earned praise as head of the Vatican's office for religious congregations, and Odilo Pedro Scherer, the 63-year-old archbishop of Sao Paulo, have been mentioned as possibilities.

Other Latin Americans posited as possible popes include Argentina's Leonardo Sandri and Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the Archbishop of Buenos Aires. Sandri is head of the Vatican's office for Eastern rite churches. He earned fame as the "voice" of Pope John Paul II when the pontiff lost the ability to speak because of his Parkinson's disease.

Also mentioned in 2005, when Benedict was chosen, was Honduran Archbishop Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga.

But it is unclear whether any one of them could gain traction.

"To see the possibilities for a Latin American pope, you have to look at the makeup of the College of Cardinals," said Bernardo Barranco, an expert at Mexico's Center for Religious Studies. "From the get-go, I see it as difficult for a Latin American ... because the college has not only been "re-Europeanized," it has also been "re-Italianized."

While some see Latin America's estimated 40 percent of the world's 1.2-billion Catholic population as a bulwark of the faith, the church is also facing challenges in the region from evangelical churches.

In Mexico, the percentage of the population who identify themselves as Catholics dropped from over 90 percent in the 1980s to 84 percent in 2010, the latest year for which data is available.

In Brazil, home to a number of charismatic or evangelical churches, the drop has been even more precipitous, from 84 percent in 1995 to 68 percent in 2010.

"In numerical terms, Latin America is majority Catholic, in broad terms, but these aren't the best times for the church," said Barranco. "On the contrary, it is going through a severe crisis the like of which it has never seen before."

Still, some see Latin America's still-large Catholic population as a decisive force.

"It would be a central argument for electing a Latin American pope, because the future of the church is in the Southern Hemisphere," said R. Andrew Chesnut, a professor of Religious Studies at the Virginia Commonwealth University. "I am not going to make any predictions, but I think there will be a contingent of European cardinals who would support an African or Latin American candidate."

For Rosita Mejia, 44, who has sold religious items for 25 years outside the La Merced church, the next pope's country of origin is less important than his vigor, energy and proximity to the people, none of which were distinguishing characteristics of Benedict VXI.

"In five years, only one person has asked me for a Benedict prayer card. In comparison hundreds of people have asked for John Paul II," Benedict's more charismatic predecessor, she said. "I would like for the next pope to be younger, and have more time to travel the world, and perhaps come to Chile like John Paul did."

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Pope Benedict's legacy: More influential than Pope John Paul II?

Pope Benedict resigns later this month after arguably being the single most influential figure inside the Roman Catholic Church for three decades, dating to the early 1980s.

A shy but brilliant scholar whose consistent vision has been to reinstitute the grand authority held by the Vatican in the Middle Ages, Benedict has, often single-handedly, redirected his church away from the liberal experiments and sometimes amateurish enthusiasms of the Vatican II period of the 1960s, which conservatives saw as a dangerous diversion. He has also, over years, instituted doctrines, individuals, and orders consistent with his theological view of the Catholic Church as the true and only authentic one.

While not as widely beloved as his predecessor John Paul II, the popular Polish pope who helped crack the Soviet hold on eastern Europe and attracted global crowds, Benedict arguably has had more influence inside the church – even as he often irritated Protestants who he said were not "authentic" Christians, angered Muslims by put-downs of Islamic figures, or unsettled Jewish-Catholic relations by rehabilitating a fringe religious society with a bishop who denied the severity of the Nazi holocaust.

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Benedict's chief occupation as pope has been, observers say, to purify his church.

To do so, Benedict crushed the liberation theology movements of the third world, put a slammer hold on efforts to ordain women and question celibacy, put earlier ecumenical impulses on the back burner, and, instead, has greatly empowered more hardcore orders like Opus Dei, Legions of Christ, and other orthodox wings, largely on the idea that the church must first cherish its most ardent believers.

Yet, while Benedict has won many battles inside the church, he is also widely seen as having lost many larger wars that he either instituted or took part in.

Benedict’s effort to reinstitute Christianity in its European context has largely failed to generate enthusiasm on a continent increasingly secular. While in pursuit of liberal priests and nuns who he implied were polluting the church with wrong doctrines, Benedict has appeared to many Europeans to be too inattentive to priests who sexually abused minors, of whom there are an estimated 8,000. The revelations of sexually abusive priests in Germany, Ireland, Belgium, and Austria two years ago brought a change to the story line that such problems were restricted to the United States.

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For fully believing Catholics, the Roman church is a divine, not a human institution; its leader, the pope, is the “vicar of Christ,” the direct spiritual descendant of Jesus Christ and his disciple Peter. The kingdom of heaven on earth that Jesus asked his followers to pray for, must, in orthodox Catholic doctrine, come through the Catholic Church and the pope, also known as the Holy Father.

For many modern-thinking or non-literal Catholics, particularly after the long-running church self-examination known as Vatican II, those orthodox doctrines of the identity of the church and the pope were put in question and thrown open for new interpretation.

Vatican II lead, though often quite indirectly, to a massive re-evaluation of things like the operation of the spirit in the church, the possibility of women being ordained as priests, a faint questioning of the doctrine, only adopted in pre-medieval Europe, of celibacy, and of more "democracy" or power by the laity or non-clergy members in matters of church governance.

For a rising college theology professor named Joseph Ratzinger, these new interpretations were viewed with increasing horror. They often lacked seriousness, were sloppy, and seemed chaotic and undignified.

As then-Cardinal Ratzinger, Benedict took office in 1982 as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the same office that earlier conducted or oversaw heresy trials. Yet while that office has a five-year term and most predecessors held it for 10 years at most, Ratzinger stayed 24 years, only leaving to become pope in 2005.

Now, as Catholics think through their future they will do so with a set of cardinals, bishops, priests, and church authorities that have largely been vetted through the orthodox filter set up by the Bavarian-born pontiff.

Indeed, a church hierarchy carefully pruned of liberal and ecumenical impulses may be one of Benedict’s enduring legacies, though it has brought the current pontiff into serious disagreements with powerful orders, like the Jesuits, that previously saw themselves as the main defenders of Rome.

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Pope shows lifetime jobs aren't always for life

The world seems surprised that an 85-year-old globe-trotting pope who just started tweeting wants to resign, but should it be? Maybe what should be surprising is that more leaders his age do not, considering the toll aging takes on bodies and minds amid a culture of constant communication and change.

There may be more behind the story of why Pope Benedict XVI decided to leave a job normally held for life. But the pontiff made it about age. He said the job called for "both strength of mind and body" and said his was deteriorating. He spoke of "today's world, subject to so many rapid changes," implying a difficulty keeping up despite his recent debut on Twitter.

"This seemed to me a very brave, courageous decision," especially because older people often don't recognize their own decline, said Dr. Seth Landefeld, an expert on aging and chairman of medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Age has driven many leaders from jobs that used to be for life — Supreme Court justices, monarchs and other heads of state. As lifetimes expand, the woes of old age are catching up with more in seats of power. Some are choosing to step down rather than suffer long declines and disabilities as the pope's last predecessor did.

Since 1955, only one U.S. Supreme Court justice — Chief Justice William Rehnquist — has died in office. Twenty-one others chose to retire, the most recent being John Paul Stevens, who stepped down in 2010 at age 90.

When Thurgood Marshall stepped down in 1991 at the age of 82, citing health reasons, the Supreme Court justice's answer was blunt: "What's wrong with me? I'm old. I'm getting old and falling apart."

One in 5 U.S. senators is 70 or older, and some have retired rather than seek new terms, such as Hawaii's Daniel Akaka, who left office in January at age 88.

The Netherlands' Queen Beatrix, who just turned 75, recently said she will pass the crown to a son and put the country "in the hands of a new generation."

In Germany, where the pope was born, Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is 58, said the pope's decision that he was no longer fit for the job "earns my very highest respect."

"In our time of ever-lengthening life, many people will be able to understand how the pope as well has to deal with the burdens of aging," she told reporters in Berlin.

Experts on aging agreed.

"People's mental capacities in their 80s and 90s aren't what they were in their 40s and 50s. Their short-term memory is often not as good, their ability to think quickly on their feet, to execute decisions is often not as good," Landefeld said. Change is tougher to handle with age, and leaders like popes and presidents face "extraordinary demands that would tax anybody's physical and mental stamina."

Dr. Barbara Messinger-Rapport, geriatrics chief at the Cleveland Clinic, noted that half of people 85 and older in developed countries have some dementia, usually Alzheimer's. Even without such a disease, "it takes longer to make decisions, it takes longer to learn new things," she said.

But that's far from universal, said Dr. Thomas Perls, an expert on aging at Boston University and director of the New England Centenarians Study.

"Usually a man who is entirely healthy in his early 80s has demonstrated his survival prowess" and can live much longer, he said. People of privilege have better odds because they have access to good food and health care, and tend to lead clean lives.

"Even in the 1500s and 1600s there were popes in their 80s. It's remarkable. That would be today's centenarians," Perls said.

Arizona Sen. John McCain turned 71 while running for president in 2007. Had he won, he would have been the oldest person elected to a first term as president. Ronald Reagan was days away from turning 70 when he started his first term as president in 1981; he won re-election in 1984. Vice President Joe Biden just turned 70.

In the U.S. Senate, where seniority is rewarded and revered, South Carolina's Strom Thurmond didn't retire until age 100 in 2002. Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia was the longest-serving senator when he died in office at 92 in 2010.

Now the oldest U.S. senator is 89-year-old Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey. The oldest congressman is Ralph Hall of Texas who turns 90 in May.

The legendary Alan Greenspan was about to turn 80 when he retired as chairman of the Federal Reserve in 2006; he still works as a consultant.

Elsewhere around the world, Cuba's Fidel Castro — one of the world's longest serving heads of state — stepped down in 2006 at age 79 due to an intestinal illness that nearly killed him, handing power to his younger brother Raul. But the island is an example of aged leaders pushing on well into their dotage. Raul Castro now is 81 and his two top lieutenants are also octogenarians. Later this month, he is expected to be named to a new, five-year term as president.

Other leaders who are still working:

—England's Queen Elizabeth, 86.

—Abdullah bin Abd al-Aziz al-Saud, king of Saudi Arabia, 88.

—Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah, emir of Kuwait, 83.

—Ruth Bader Ginsburg, U.S. Supreme Court associate justice, 79.

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Associated Press writers Paul Haven in Havana, Cuba; David Rising in Berlin; Seth Borenstein, Mark Sherman and Matt Yancey in Washington, and researcher Judy Ausuebel in New York contributed to this report.

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Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP

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Pope's mission to revive faith clouded by scandal

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Benedict XVI always cast himself as the reluctant pope, a shy bookworm who preferred solitary walks in the Alps to the public glare and the majesty of Vatican pageantry. But once in office, he never shied from charting the Catholic Church on the course he thought it needed — a determination reflected in his stunning announcement Monday that he would be the first pope to resign since 1415.

While taking the Vatican and world by surprise, Benedict had laid the groundwork for the decision years ago, saying popes have the obligation to resign if they get too old or sick to carry on. And to many, his decision was perfectly in keeping with a man who had dedicated his life to the church, showing his love for the institution and a courageous acknowledgment that it needed new blood to confront the future.

"This decision, even though it fills us with surprise — and at first glance leaves us with many questions — will be as he said for the good of the church," said Cardinal Angelo Scola, the archbishop of Milan, who is a leading contender to succeed Benedict.

The German theologian, whose mission was to reawaken Christianity in a secularized Europe, grew increasingly frail as he shouldered the monumental task of purging the Catholic world of a sex abuse scandal that festered under John Paul II and exploded during his reign into the church's biggest crisis in decades, if not centuries.

More recently, he bore the painful burden of betrayal by one of his closest aides: Benedict's own butler was convicted by a Vatican court of stealing the pontiff's personal papers and giving them to a journalist, one of the gravest breaches of papal security in modern times.

All the while, Benedict pursued his single-minded vision to rekindle faith in a world which, he frequently lamented, seemed to think it could do without God.

"In vast areas of the world today, there is a strange forgetfulness of God," he told 1 million young people gathered on a vast field for his first foreign trip as pope, World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany in 2005. "It seems as if everything would be just the same even without Him."

With some decisive, often controversial moves, Benedict tried to remind Europe of its Christian heritage and set the Catholic Church on a conservative, tradition-minded path that often alienated progressives and thrilled conservatives.

The Vatican's crackdown on American nuns — accused of straying from church doctrine in pursuing social justice issues rather than stressing core church teaching on abortion and homosexuality — left a bitter taste for many American Catholics.

But conservatives cheered his championing of the pre-Vatican II church and his insistence on tradition, even if it cost the church popularity among liberals.

As he said in his 1996 book "Salt of the Earth," a smaller but purer church may be necessary. "Maybe we are facing a new and different kind of epoch in the church's history, where Christianity will again be characterized more by the mustard seed, where it will exist in small, seemingly insignificant groups that nonetheless live an intensive struggle against evil and bring the good into the world — that let God in," he said then.

Yet his papacy will be forever intertwined with the sex abuse scandal.

Over the course of just a few months in 2010, thousands of people in Europe, Australia, South America and beyond came forward with reports of priests who raped and molested them as children, and bishops who covered up the crimes.

Documents revealed that the Vatican knew well of the problem yet turned a blind eye for decades, at times rebuffing bishops who tried to do the right thing.

Benedict had firsthand knowledge of the scope of the problem since his old office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith which he had headed since 1982, was responsible for dealing with abuse cases.

He met with victims across the globe, wept with them and prayed with them. He promised that the church must "do everything possible" to ensure such crimes never happen again. The Vatican updated its legal code to extend the statute of limitations for cases and told bishops' conferences around the world to come up with guidelines to prevent abuse.

But Benedict never admitted any personal or Vatican failure. Much to the dismay of victims, he never took action against bishops who ignored or covered up the abuse of their priests or moved known pedophiles to new posts where they abused again.

And hard as he tried to heal the church's wounds, Benedict's message was always clouded by his personal style. No globe-trotting showman or media darling like John Paul, Benedict was a teacher and academic to the core: quiet and pensive with a fierce mind. He spoke in paragraphs, not sound bites. In recent years, his declining health made him seem increasingly fragile and somewhat disengaged in public. And he was notoriously prone to gaffes, though that was perhaps more a fault of his advisers than the pope himself.

Some of Benedict's most lasting initiatives as pope — the actions he will be remembered for — focused on restoring traditional Catholic practice and worship to 21st century Catholicism. It was all in a bid to correct what he considered the erroneous interpretation of the Second Vatican Council, the 1962-65 meetings that brought the Catholic Church into the modern world.

His conservative vision is a direction his successor will likely continue given that the bulk of the College of Cardinals — the princes of the church who will elect the next pope — was hand-picked by Benedict to guarantee his legacy and ensure an orthodox future for the church.

Hans Kueng, a one-time colleague-turned-critic, said he respected Benedict's decision to resign but that he hoped that the pope "will not exert influence on the election of his successor."

In comments to the dpa news agency, Kueng said it would be hard to find someone "who could lead the church out of its many-layered crisis."

Benedict relaxed restrictions on celebrating the old, pre-Vatican II Latin Mass. He reached out to a group of traditionalist, schismatic Catholics in a bid to bring them back into Rome's fold. And he issued an unprecedented invitation to traditionalist Anglicans upset over women priests and gay bishops to join the Roman Catholic Church.

In doing so, he alienated many progressive Catholics who feared he was rolling back the clock on Vatican II. He also angered some Jews who equated the pre-Vatican II church with the time when Jews were still considered ripe for conversion and were held responsible collectively for the death of Christ.

Yet like John Paul, Benedict had made reaching out to Jews a hallmark of his papacy. His first official act as pope was a letter to Rome's Jewish community and he became the second pope in history, after John Paul, to enter a synagogue.

And in his 2011 book "Jesus of Nazareth" Benedict made a sweeping exoneration of the Jewish people for the death of Christ, explaining biblically and theologically why there was no basis in Scripture for the argument that the Jewish people as a whole were responsible for Jesus' death.

"It's very clear Benedict is a true friend of the Jewish people," said Rabbi David Rosen, who heads the interreligious relations office for the American Jewish Committee.

During his trip to Poland, Benedict prayed at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp — a visit heavy with significance for a German pope on Polish soil.

"In a place like this, words fail; in the end, there can be only a dread silence, a silence which itself is a heartfelt cry to God: Why, Lord, did you remain silent?" he asked.

His 2009 visit to Israel, however, drew a lukewarm response from officials at Jerusalem's national Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial who found Benedict's speech lacking. His call for a Palestinian state also put a damper on the visit.

Jews were also incensed at Benedict's constant promotion toward sainthood of Pope Pius XII, the World War II-era pope accused by some of having failed to sufficiently denounce the Holocaust. And they harshly criticized Benedict when he removed the excommunication of a traditionalist British bishop who had denied the Holocaust.

Benedict's relations with the Muslim world were also a mixed bag.

He riled the Muslim world with a speech in Regensburg, Germany in September 2006, five years after the terror attacks in the United States, in which he quoted a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."

Much of the outrage that ensued from Benedict's interfaith missteps was due to the Holy See's communications problems: The Vatican under Benedict suffered notorious PR hiccups, constantly finding itself slow to react to news and then reacting with muddled messages that required two or three clarifications before getting it straight.

Sometimes Benedict himself was to blame.

In 2009, he enraged the United Nations and several European governments, when en route to Africa, he told reporters that the AIDS problem couldn't be resolved by distributing condoms. "On the contrary, it increases the problem," he said then.

A year later, he issued a revision that seemed to placate liberals while maintaining church teaching opposing contraception: In a book-length interview, he said that if a male prostitute were to use a condom to avoid passing on HIV to his partner, he might be taking a first step toward a more responsible sexuality.

It was a significant shift given the Vatican's repeated position that abstinence and marital fidelity were the only sure ways to stop the virus. Benedict repeated that line and stressed that sex outside marriage was immoral, but his comments nevertheless marked the first time a pope had even acknowledged that condoms had a role to play in stopping HIV.

When he was elected the 265th leader of the Church on April 19, 2005, Benedict, aged 78, was the oldest pope elected in 275 years and the first German one in nearly 1,000 years.

As John Paul's right-hand man, he had been a favorite going into the vote and was selected in the fastest conclave in a century: Just about 24 hours after the voting began, white smoke curled from the Sistine Chapel chimney at 5:50 p.m. to announce "Habemus Papam!"

Though clearly intending to carry on John Paul's legacy, Benedict didn't try to emulate his predecessor's popular acclaim. His foreign trips were short and focused. His Masses were solemn, his homilies dense and professorial.

And he wasn't afraid to challenge John Paul's legacy when he believed his predecessor had erred.

In one remarkable instance, he essentially took over the Legionaries of Christ, a conservative religious order held up as a model of orthodoxy by John Paul after it was revealed that its founder, the Rev. Marciel Maciel, sexually abused seminarians and fathered at least three children.

Under John Paul, who had been a fierce supporter of Maciel, the Vatican's investigation into the Mexican priest had languished. But a year after Benedict became pope, Maciel was sentenced to a lifetime of penance and prayer, and in 2010 the order was essentially put under receivership by the Vatican because of a host of spiritual, financial and other problems.

He wrote three encyclicals, "God is Love" in 2006, "Saved by Hope" in 2007 and "Charity in Truth" in 2009. The latter was perhaps his best known as it called for a new world financial order guided by ethics that was published in the throes of the global financial meltdown.

Benedict's call, however, would strike some as hypocritical when a year later the Holy See's top two banking officials were placed under investigation in a money laundering probe that resulted in the seizure of millions of euros from a Vatican Bank account. The money was later released after Benedict, the Vatican's top legislator, amended the city state's legal code to comply with international norms to fight money laundering and terror financing.

The Vatican's finances though also came under scrutiny when Benedict's own butler, Paolo Gabriele, was arrested in May 2012 and charged with stealing the pope's personal correspondence and leaking the documents to a journalist. Gabriele told Vatican investigators he did so because he thought the pope wasn't being informed of the "evil and corruption" in the Vatican and thought that exposing it publicly would put the church back on the right track. Gabriele was eventually sentenced to 18 months in prison, though Benedict later pardoned him.

As soon as he was elected, Benedict moved decisively on a few selected fronts: He made clear early on that he wanted to re-establish diplomatic relations with China that were severed in 1951. He wrote a landmark letter to the 12 million Chinese faithful in 2007, urging them to unite under Rome's wing. But tensions with the state-backed church remained with several illicit ordinations of Chinese bishops without papal consent.

Within his first year, Benedict also signed off on a long-awaited document barring most gays from the priesthood in a move that riled many in the American church. But in a document welcomed by liberal Catholics, he also essentially abolished "limbo," saying there was hope to think that babies who died without being baptized would go to heaven.

And in one of his most popular acts, he beatified his predecessor in record time, drawing 1.5 million people to Rome in 2011 to witness John Paul move a step closer to sainthood.

Benedict favored Masses heavy in Latin and the brocaded silk vestments of his predecessors. His fondness for Gregorian chant and Mozart — he was an accomplished classical pianist — found its way into papal Masses and concerts performed in his honor, some of the only times the workaholic Benedict was seen relaxing and enjoying himself.

He had a weakness for orange Fanta, small animals and his beloved library; when he was elected pope, he had his entire study moved — as is — from his apartment just outside the Vatican walls into the Apostolic Palace.

"In them are all my advisers," he said of his books in the 2010 book-length interview "Light of the World." ''I know every nook and cranny, and everything has its history."

He fed the goldfish in the pond at the papal summer retreat each day during his vacations, and once, when some lion cubs were brought to an audience at the Vatican, he bent down to pet one — no easy feat for a man of his age.

Years after he had left, colleagues from his days at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith spoke wistfully, even nostalgically of his tenure setting the course of Catholic doctrine and discipline and presiding over the creation of the monumental "Catechism of the Catholic Church" — a synthesis of key Catholic teaching.

His presentations at monthly department meetings were "magisterial," they said, worthy of the church's permanent teachings. They said he fostered a "family" inside the hallowed yellow halls of the Holy Office, once known as the Inquisition.

"It was not easy to succeed Pope John Paul II, but he managed to fulfill what he had said he would do at the start of his pontificate — be himself," said Maltese Bishop Charles Scicluna, who worked under Benedict at the Congregation as the Vatican's chief sex crimes prosecutor.

Benedict's real family consisted of his brother Georg, also a priest and a frequent summer visitor to Castel Gandolfo. His sister died years previous.

His "papal family" consisted of Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, his longtime private secretary who was always by his side, another secretary and four consecrated women who tended to the papal apartment.

They shared meals, celebrated daily Mass together and at the end of the day watched DVDs, especially of Benedict's favorite show "Don Camillo and Peppone," a black and white comedy from the 1950s about the pastor of a small Italian town and its Communist mayor.

Benedict was born April 16, 1927 in Marktl Am Inn, in Bavaria, but his father, a policeman, moved frequently and the family left when he was 2.

In his memoirs, Benedict dealt what could have been a source of controversy had it been kept secret — that he was enlisted in the Nazi youth movement against his will when he was 14 in 1941, when membership was compulsory. He said he was soon let out because of his studies for the priesthood. Two years later he was drafted into a Nazi anti-aircraft unit as a helper. He deserted the German army in April 1945, the waning days of the war.

He called it prophetic that a German followed a Polish pope — with both men coming from such different sides of World War II.

Benedict was ordained, along with his brother, in 1951. After spending several years teaching theology in Germany, he was appointed bishop of Munich in 1977 and elevated to cardinal three months later by Pope Paul VI.

John Paul named him leader of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 1981 and he took up his post a year later. Following John Paul's death in 2005, he was elected pope.

If there were any doubts about Benedict's priority to reinvigorate Christianity in Europe, his choice of a papal name was as good as any indication.

Benedict told cardinals soon after he was elected that he hoped to be a pope of peace, like Pope Benedict XV, who reigned during World War I. But the first Benedict — St. Benedict of Norcia — was also an inspiration.

The 5th and 6th century monk is a patron saint of Europe and inspired the creation of the Benedictine order, the main guardian of learning and literature in Western Europe during the dark centuries that followed the fall of the Roman Empire.

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Shock step by traditional pope in line with Church law

PARIS (Reuters) - Pope Benedict would not be the meticulous theologian he has always been if he didn't make sure even his shocking resignation - the first by a pontiff in over 700 years - was fully in line with Roman Catholic doctrine.

His announcement was so stunning that many Catholics will have instinctively asked if a pope is allowed to step down. For many of them, Pope John Paul's long and very public agony before he died in 2005 is the iconic image of the end of a papacy.

But the Code of Canon Law, the legal corpus governing the Church, clearly provides for a papal resignation in its Canon 332. John Paul mentioned it in a detailed 1996 document that laid down the procedure for electing a new pope.

Benedict's reputation as an orthodox and self-effacing pope ensures there will be few questions about the legality of the move and will reduce speculation that he plans to continue to play a decisive role behind the scenes.

"This is a very surprising move from a very traditional pope," said Christopher Bellitto, a Church historian at Kean University in New Jersey. "It's quite heroic."

Benedict's deep respect for the papacy insures he will avoid the problems that could arise, he said: "He's a company man - he's not going to do anything to harm the institution."

By citing health reasons for his decision, Benedict has also helped the Church by setting a modern precedent for resigning at a time when medical progress means the elderly can live far beyond their active years.

"There will be more and more medical issues, like what to do if a pope is incapacitated, and this will make it easier for future popes to resign," Bellitto said.

THE EMPTY SEAT

The main threat to the papacy that a retired pope poses is what the Church calls "sedevacantism," or the belief that the new pope is not the valid pontiff and the See of Saint Peter - the papal throne - is actually vacant.

A tiny group of ultra-conservative Catholics say the papacy has actually been vacant since the death of Pius XII in 1958 because his successor, John XXIII, called the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) that brought in sweeping reforms.

Any statement or action by a former pope could give arguments to supporters of this theory, which is one reason why Benedict will live in a cloistered convent inside the Vatican walls and probably appear rarely if ever in public.

"Inevitably there will be a group that follows him and sets up a website about it," Bellitto said. But Benedict, who wanted to retire to write books even before John Paul died, will probably turn down any request to speak in public.

"He'll probably lead the kind of life he expected to lead before he became pope," the historian added.

While Benedict is the first pope to resign since Celestine V in 1294, he is far from being the first to consider it.

John Paul prepared letters of resignation in 1989 and 1994 in case he was incapacitated. Pius XII is believed to have done the same during the Second World War in case he was captured by the Nazis, but his archives have not yet been opened to confirm this.

AUTHORITY ANOTHER ISSUE

Another issue is whether a retired pope would retain the spiritual authority he had while in office. One might assume this because a retired bishop remains a bishop in the eyes of the Church, even without his administrative authority.

But the Catholic priesthood has only three ministerial orders - bishop, priest and deacon. The posts above them, such as archbishop, cardinal and pope, are Church offices.

So on his resignation, Benedict will lose not only the office of pope but also several titles that go with it including Vicar of Jesus Christ, Bishop of Rome, Sovereign of the Vatican City State and Servant of the Servants of God.

"If he resigns the office, he no longer has the authority of Saint Peter de facto," said Bellitto.

The link to Saint Peter is essential because he was the first pope, chosen by Jesus, and the Church traces its hierarchy back to his authority being passed down through the centuries to the present pope and bishops.

The Vatican has a detailed plan for dealing with a papal interregnum. In the absence of a pope, the College of Cardinals, made up of the senior-most prelates, runs the daily government of the Church and organizes the closed-door conclave to elect the next pope, but cannot make major policy decisions.

The Vatican said the new pope should be in office before Easter, which falls on March 31 this year, but has not given any further details.

Under the rules from 1996, a conclave must start between 15 and 20 days after the death of a pope. However, that includes nine days for mourning and a funeral. If the Vatican subtracts the mourning and funeral period, the conclave could start between six and 11 days after Benedict resigns on Feb 28.

(Reporting By Tom Heneghan; Editing by Peter Graff)

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Philippines Catholics hope, pray for Asia's first pope

MANILA (Reuters) - With attention turning from Europe to the "new" world, worshippers in the Philippines prayed quietly and took to social media on Tuesday in the hope their cardinal might be chosen as the next leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics.

Many Catholics in the Philippines, the largest Christian community in Asia, were shocked by Pope Benedict's resignation, including their charismatic leader, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle.

"Pope Benedict XVI's renunciation of the ministry as Bishop of Rome on February 11, 2013 came as a surprise," Tagle said in a statement.

"The announcement also brought sadness to us. We felt like children clinging to a father who bids them farewell," he said, praising Benedict's "humility, honesty, courage and sincerity".

Stunning as it was, Benedict's resignation has thrown the papal spotlight outside the Church's European heartland, now home to only 25 percent of the Catholic population.

The post once reserved for Italians is now open for all, although about half the cardinals who will vote for the next pope after Benedict's reign ends on February 28 are from Europe.

Latin America represents the largest single bloc in the Church with 42 percent of Catholics, putting Latin Americans and African cardinals among the front-runners to succeed 85-year-old Pope Benedict.

Tagle's close alignment to Pope Benedict, an uncompromising conservative on social and theological issues, could work in his favor, with the Philippines a bulwark of Catholicism in a mainly Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist region.

He offered a glimpse of that conservatism in comments published after his elevation to cardinal in November: "The Church must discover the power of silence.

"Confronted with the sorrows, doubts and uncertainties of people, she cannot pretend to give easy solutions," he said.

LONG-SHOT POPE

Many Filipinos felt the Church could do worse than choose Tagle, at 55 relatively young, as its next leader.

"The Filipino cardinal, Luis Antonio Tagle, will be a long-shot but he could be considered because he is also known as a Vatican insider and a former adviser of the Pope," said Joselito Zulueta, a teacher, journalist and analyst of church affairs in the Philippines.

Tagle's personal appeal has been compared to that of the late Pope John Paul and he worked with Pope Benedict at the International Theological Commission.

Father Francis Lucas of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines said a Filipino pope would be like "a dream".

"He is humble, he's meek, he's simple, he's spiritual, he's media savvy, he's very bright."

But Tagle's youth, and the fact that he only became a cardinal late in 2012, may work against him. "What we should do is not pray for Cardinal Tagle but pray for the right pope, as inspired by the Holy Spirit, to be elected by the cardinal members of the conclave," Lucas said.

The Twitter hashtag "#Tagleforpope" appeared within hours of Benedict's statement, with one comment among scores posted on Tuesday saying of Tagle: "Archbishop of Manila in 2011, Cardinal in 2012, Pope in 2013?"

"Cardinal Tagle is qualified, young and can bring more energy to the Catholic Church," said Maria Paz Balagot, a sales executive in Manila's financial district.

While hope grew in the Philippines, Australia's Cardinal George Pell, a conservative supporter of Benedict's among the conclave of cardinals, cautioned against seeing Benedict's resignation as the start of a new era for the Church.

"Every pope presents a change," Pell said in an internal video interview conducted by the Church in Australia. "I'm pretty confident that there'll be a basic continuity."

(Additional reporting by Erik dela Cruz in MANILA and Rob Taylor in CANBERRA; Writing by Paul Tait; Editing by Alex Richardson)

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How will the Catholic Church handle a living ex-pope?

The resignation of Benedict XVI raises a conundrum not faced by the Catholic Church for centuries: How do you handle a still living ex-pope?

For the entire 2,000 year history of the Church, the accepted orthodoxy has been for a pope to rule until he dies. A select group of cardinals then get together in a secretive conclave and a successor is chosen, in a clean break from the past.

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All that has been turned on its head by Benedict’s surprise resignation, the first in the papacy since 1415. It raises a potential difficulty for the Vatican – that even after his retirement, he could become a lightning rod for dissatisfaction and dissent with his successor, whoever that might be.

IN RETIREMENT, POPE WILL PUBLISH

The Catholic Church has faced painful schisms throughout its history, in which rival claims to the Seat of St. Peter resulted in competing papacies. In 1415, Pope Gregory XII stepped down in an attempt to end just such a schism, when two rival claimants set themselves up in opposing cities – Pisa in Italy and Avignon in southern France – precipitating one of the Church’s gravest crises.

When Benedict formally resigns on the evening of Feb. 28, he will be taken probably by helicopter to Castel Gandolfo, the traditional summer retreat of popes, in the hills outside Rome. The 85-year-old is expected to remain there for 15 to 20 days, until the conclave of around 120 cardinals drawn from around the world gathers at the Vatican and elects a new pontiff. Benedict will then take up residence in a cloistered monastery within the Vatican City State. His title at that point? Unclear.

Inevitably he will run into his successor and will still be in daily touch with cardinals and other influential figures within the Holy See. Not only that but, according to the Vatican spokesman, Benedict will continue to write and publish treatises and essays – he is a noted theologian who recently completed a trilogy on the life of Christ.

That could produce a situation where the former pope says one thing on an important matter, while his successor says something different.

“Traditionally popes have not resigned because there is this question of what do you do with two popes,” says John Thavis, an American who has covered the Vatican for 30 years and recently wrote an insider’s account of the Holy See – “The Vatican Diaries.”

“What should be the role of a former pope – does he have to stay quiet for the rest of his life? What if he speaks up and disagrees with his successor? You then have the prospect of the Church effectively having two popes.”

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Benedict has never been regarded as a power-hungry political player and will probably embrace a return to a quiet life of study and prayer.

“I don’t think he will deliberately upstage or contradict his successor,” says Mr Thavis. “But he’s not going to be behind a wall of silence. If I was the new pope, I would be paying attention to whatever he writes about.”

VATICAN: NO CONFUSION

The Vatican spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, said there was no prospect of a schism in the Church and dismissed ideas that Benedict would attract a rival support base or interfere in papal affairs.

“We have no fears of this kind,” he told a packed press conference at the Vatican. “He will renounce the post, so there will be nothing to discuss. There will be no confusion, or division.”

In St. Peter’s Square, however, tourists and Catholic faithful were not so sure it would be quite so easy.

“To have an ex-pope who is still alive, even if they are in not very good health, is unprecedented as I understand it,” says Daniel Benedyk from London. “I don’t know how the Vatican will deal with that.”

There was collective disbelief about the news of the resignation among people strolling in front of St. Peter’s Basilica under gray winter skies.

"It was a huge surprise to me,” says Wolfgang Schnapel, a priest from Benedict's home region of Bavaria. “I only heard when my mother called me from Germany. I think it would be nice if the next pope came from Africa or Latin America. And he should definitely be younger than Benedict was.”

Flora Joseph, a nun from Tanzania, says: "It's very difficult to accept. I have been saying to myself 'why is he leaving, why doesn't he want to continue?' But he is an old man and he has so many appointments and meetings. I guess he just has no energy left anymore."

Nicola Signorile, a businessman from Bari in southern Italy, said he was deeply saddened by the announcement, speculating that the pope must be very ill –although the Vatican has given no indication he has health problems. "If he has made this choice, it must be for a very good reason."

Only a handful of Benedict’s closest confidantes knew that he had made the decision to resign, including Tarcisio Bertone, who as Vatican secretary of state is effectively prime minister of the tiny city state, Georg Ganswein, the pope’s private secretary, and Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the head of the College of Cardinals.

The papacy had seemed to many Italians like the one remaining constant in their lives after having been buffeted in the last few years by earthquakes, floods, the fall of Silvio Berlusconi, and the imposition of tough austerity measures by his successor, Mario Monti. The economy is in a deep recession and politics in turmoil ahead of a general election on Feb. 24-25.

“I can’t believe it – first the government is about to end, now it’s the papacy that’s in trouble,” says Marco, a taxi driver. “Everything is falling apart. I’ll be sad to see Benedict go. He was a bit cold and German, but he was a decent man.”

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Los Angeles Cardinal Mahony to help elect new pope

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Catholic Cardinal Roger Mahony will help elect a new pope, despite recently being rebuked for not doing more to stop sexual abuse by priests when he led the Los Angeles Archdiocese.

Mahony has been barred from public duties in the archdiocese by the current archbishop because of revelations about his past handling of clergy pedophile cases. But Mahony remains in good standing as archbishop emeritus.

Mahony says he looks forward to traveling to Rome to participate in the conclave that will choose the next pope.

He also participated in the conclave that elected Pope Benedict in 2005. Mahony says Benedict was an "extraordinary successor to St. Peter" and adds that the church will continue to be blessed by his prayers and writings.

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Rare papal resignation not a cause for anxiety or worry: Canadian archbishop

TORONTO - Surprise, a lack of understanding and even some disappointment — those were among the initial emotions expressed by a number of Canadians on Monday after Pope Benedict XVI announced he would be resigning at the end of the month.

Canadians holding high office in the Catholic church acknowledged the Pope's move was unconvential and a shock for the church, but said it was something Benedict did for the good of the church.

"This is not a cause for anxiety or worry because the church has been, is now, and always will be in the hands of God, and guided by God," said Archbishop Richard Smith, who is also president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"This particular decision, as surprising and unprecedented as it is in modern times, is thoroughly consistent with the witness that (Benedict) has given us through many, many years. It is something that he has taken with serious thought, solely for the good of the church."

Benedict becomes the first pontiff to step down in 600 years. The 85-year-old declared he would resign Feb. 28, citing a lack of strength to do the job.

The news drew exclamations from parishioners, some of whom headed to mid-day mass specifically to seek further information on the Pope's startling announcement.

"I'm so sad," said Ana Amos, 48, as she headed into St. Michael's Cathedral in Toronto. "I cried when Pope John Paul died, and next I was happy that another pope came, but now he is resigning, I don't know why?"

Other Canadians mourned Benedict's impending departure.

"We have never had such a brilliant man in the papacy. It's going to be quite a loss," said Helene Hoffman before she sat down for mass. "He's a great Pope, it's just strange that he's leaving."

There were those, however, who thought Benedict's move was the right one.

"We need somebody younger to be able to carry out the duties of the pope," said Maria Ebhabha. "I think he did a good thing, because he's old."

A conclave of cardinals will select Benedict's successor in Rome in the coming weeks. Among those being mentioned as a strong contender is Quebec native, Marc Cardinal Ouellet, who currently heads the Congregation for Bishops, which vets bishops nominations worldwide.

The Archbishop of Toronto, Thomas Cardinal Collins, who will be among those choosing the next pope, offered few thoughts on Ouellet's chances, saying it was too early to speculate on Benedict's successor.

For Collins, Benedict's resignation heralds a time of deep reflection on the qualities desired in the next pope, and signals a period during which the current pontiff's contributions to the faith ought to be celebrated.

"I think the whole church gathers together at such a time in prayer for the college of cardinals and this most profound mission we have," he said. "I think it is a time for us to give thanks to God for the tremendous leadership of Pope Benedict who speaks with clarity and charity.

In Collins's estimation, Monday's news was no cause for faith in the church to be shaken.

"Normally popes have gone till death and this is a change in that," he admitted. "Not having Pope Benedict as Pope is obviously a great shock for the church and a loss for the church ... but each person has to read the time and their own person, and what is best and that's entrusted to the pope to read that."

The last pope to resign was Pope Gregory XII, who stepped down in 1415 in a deal to end the Great Western Schism, a dispute among competing papal claimants.

Whether Benedict's resignation will pave a path for more modern-day resignations, however, remains to be seen, said Queen’s University teaching fellow Robert Dennis, who specializes in the history of the modern Vatican.

"There really is no modern equivalent for it," said Dennis, who is also vice president of the Canadian Catholic Historical Association.

"I don't know if we can say this will be the norm going forward. I think it will very much be a matter of the conscience of the individual person."

Regardless of how the move impacts the highest offices of the church, for those in the pews, Dennis said Benedict's resignation will take some time to be digested, but ought to eventually be accepted as one which wasn't made lightly.

"Nobody has a memory of this happening, obviously. So it will probably affect people in different ways," he said. "That a pope can move on from the office is probably something not everyone will feel comfortable with, and at the same time there's recognition that the office has demands and there's a very human element...that there is perhaps the need for someone that has a more youthful vitality."

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Benedict stumbled trying to right troubled church

Pope Benedict XVI set clear and ambitious goals for his papacy quickly after he was elected: He hoped to re-evangelize the increasingly secular West. He would show that religious faith and reason could co-exist in the modern world. He would reach out to traditionalists who had split from the church and shore up Catholic identity.

He came into the papacy with the reputation of a brilliant theologian; nearly eight years later, he leaves the Holy See with that reputation intact. But because of burdens he inherited and ongoing problems in his own pontificate, Benedict fell short of the mark he set for himself on unifying the church, building relationships with other religions and restoring the church's influence in broader society.

A look at some aspects of his legacy:

CHRISTIAN HERITAGE: Benedict dedicated his pontificate to stemming the spread of secularism, especially in Europe, where church attendance has dwindled. He condemned same-sex marriage, argued that gender had become something chosen instead of given from God, and said lack of belief was dangerous, pointing to violence that resulted when past atheist governments "tried to stamp out the light of God to instead turn on illusory and misleading glows." Yet even as he made his arguments, acceptance of same-sex relationships grew throughout Europe and the United States.

RESTORING TRADITION: Benedict wanted to restore Catholic traditions largely abandoned during the modernizing changes of the Second Vatican Council. The pope relaxed restrictions on celebrating the old Latin Mass. He streamlined the process for traditional Anglicans who, objecting to ordaining women and gays in their own church, wanted to become Catholic. He even donned pontifical hats and other clothing that hadn't been worn in decades. Many younger Catholics responded to his emphasis on orthodoxy and a stronger sense of Catholic identity. But many others were alienated. In the United States alone, studies have found Catholics dropping out of the church in large numbers.

VATICAN SCANDALS: Some major scandals shook the Vatican during Benedict's pontificate. In 2010, the Holy See's top two banking officials came under scrutiny in a money laundering inquiry that resulted in millions of euros being seized from a Vatican bank account. The pope hired a Swiss expert a few months ago to help upgrade safeguards against wrongdoing, but problems remained. Meanwhile, the pope's butler, Paolo Gabriele, was sentenced to prison after stealing the pope's personal correspondence and leaking the documents to a journalist. Gabriele said he thought the pope wasn't being informed of the "evil and corruption" in the Vatican. Benedict later pardoned him.

PAPAL GAFFES: Benedict was a star on Twitter and his books were popular far beyond the Catholic Church. But his pontificate was marred by ongoing communication blunders. Benedict riled the Muslim world with a speech in Regensburg, Germany, in September 2006 in which he quoted a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith." In 2009, the pope enraged the United Nations and several European governments when, en route to Africa, he told reporters that using condoms "increases the problem" of AIDS. Last year, a Vatican-ordered reform of American nuns prompted widespread condemnation of church leaders and a dramatic outpouring of support for religious sisters. The overhaul order came after bishops accused American nuns of promoting "certain radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith." Last June, the pope hired Fox News Channel's former Rome correspondent to help advise Vatican officials on how they should shape their message.

SEX ABUSE SCANDAL: Benedict became the first pope to meet with victims of clergy sex abuse. In 2010, he issued an unprecedented apology to Ireland for chronic abuse, appealing to any remaining guilty clergy to "submit yourselves to the demands of justice." In another dramatic move, he ordered a full-scale reform of the Legionaries of Christ, a conservative religious order that Pope John Paul II had championed whose founder for years sexually abused seminarians and fathered at least three children. However, Benedict didn't discipline church leaders who kept guilty priests in ministry or hid claims from parents and police. "His method was to translate crimes into sins, and sins can be forgiven, sins of the cardinals and bishops," said author Jason Berry, who has written extensively on the crisis, including the book "Render Unto Rome."

CATHOLIC-JEWISH RELATIONS: Benedict's first official act as pope was a letter to Rome's Jewish community. In his 2011 book, "Jesus of Nazareth," he made a sweeping exoneration of the Jewish people for the death of Christ, explaining biblically and theologically why there was no basis in Scripture for the argument that the Jewish people as a whole were responsible for Jesus' death. However, he also angered Jews on a number of fronts. Jewish leaders harshly criticized Benedict when he removed the excommunication of a traditionalist British bishop who had denied the Holocaust. Jews were also incensed at Benedict's constant promotion toward sainthood of Pope Pius XII, the World War II-era pope accused by some of having failed to sufficiently denounce the Holocaust. "There were bumps in the road during this papacy," said Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. "But he listened to our concerns and tried to address them."

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Bookmakers see three-cardinal race to be next Pope

LONDON (Reuters) - British and Irish bookmakers ranked Nigeria's Cardinal Francis Arinze, Peter Turkson of Ghana and Canadian Marc Ouellet on Monday as favorites to lead the Roman Catholic Church, setting odds swiftly after Pope Benedict's shock resignation.

William Hill, Britain's largest bookmaker, offered odds of 3/1 against for Arinze, or a probability of 25 percent, while Ouellet and Turkson were priced at 7/2 against, meaning successful punters would win seven pounds for every two staked.

Irish bookmaker Paddy Power had the same three cardinals as leading contenders but placed Ouellet as favorite ahead of the two Africans. Britain's Ladbrokes narrowly made Turkson its initial frontrunner.

"I have been taking bets on the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury for as long as I care to remember," said William Hill spokesman Graham Sharpe, denying that gambling on the papal succession was blasphemous.

"It's fair to say that this is the first papal punt to be decided in the full Internet betting era," he added, noting the growth of online gambling could make for a more lively market.

"It's not going to rival the Champions League (soccer) but it will produce enough turnover to make it worth doing."

Arinze and Benedict, who was then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, were both among the bookmakers' favorites in 2005 when the German was elected to succeed Pope John Paul II, Sharpe said.

Two outsiders on the Paddy Power list of contenders showed the Irish bookmaker's customary eye for a publicity stunt.

Dark horses included the British scientist and atheism campaigner Richard Dawkins on 666/1 and the fictional Father Dougal McGuire, a hapless priest from the 1990s Irish TV comedy show 'Father Ted' on 1000/1, the same odds as the Irish U2 singer Bono.

(Writing by Keith Weir; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

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Catholics shocked as pope resigns, but little emotion

BERLIN/ROME (Reuters) - Catholics reacted with shock on Monday to the sudden abdication of Pope Benedict, although the mood among many was one of respect rather than the outpouring of emotion which greeted the death of his beloved predecessor John Paul II.

In Benedict's home country, where eight years ago the election of the first German pontiff in more than 1,000 years was greeted with the headline "We are Pope!", there was surprise tempered with sympathy.

"I didn't really think it was possible to resign. But if he feels he's not in a position to continue then it's an honorable thing to do," said Michael Lauber a 58-year-old civil servant entering St Hedwig's Roman Catholic Cathedral in central Berlin.

"It's what anyone else in any other job would have to do. I can't say I'm disappointed," said Lauber.

In Rome, the widespread mourning which greeted John Paul's death in 2005 appeared a distant memory but the news of Benedict's resignation overshadowed the increasingly bitter campaign ahead of national elections due just days before the pope leaves office at the end of the month.

"This is really extraordinary because not since Celestine V has this happened," said Rome resident Emma Nardi, referring to the last pope to leave office voluntarily, in 1294.

"It's an incredible thing, we need to see why he did it. I hope the church doesn't end up like Italian politics," she said.

Germany had an awkward relationship with Pope Benedict, who was born Joseph Ratzinger in the small Bavarian town of Marktl in 1927. Adored by some but by no means all Catholics, he was ignored or actively disliked by many other Germans.

Germany's top-selling tabloid Bild lamented the departure of "our German pope" but the mood, even among Catholic churchgoers, was subdued.

Chancellor Angela Merkel, a Protestant pastor's daughter, was one of the few European leaders to contradict the pontiff in public, criticizing him in 2009 for the Vatican's rehabilitation of a bishop who had denied the Holocaust.

But on Monday she said Pope Benedict's decision to step down deserved her "utmost respect", recalling German pride when Benedict was elected pope in 2005 and praising him as "one of the important religious thinkers of our time".

There was the same mix of surprise and understanding in Marktl, the town near the Austrian border where Benedict was born in 1927 which now does a booming trade in papal memorabilia, papal-branded cakes and other products.

"It is a huge burden every day (being pope), never being able to say a wrong word and then there are all those foreign trips," Marktl mayor Hubert Gschwendtner told Reuters, adding he expected no drop in the 100,000 people visiting the town annually.

Benedict last visited Marktl in 2006 and wrote a message: "May the Lord bless this place so dear to me."

Elsewhere in the Catholic world, Pope Benedict appeared to have earned more respect as a theologian than adoration as a leader -- suffering as always in comparison to his charismatic predecessor, the Polish-born John Paul II.

"We are dismayed because he is a saint and a first-rate intellectual," said Nani Leon, a history professor leaving San Pascual church in central Madrid. "No one expected this, although he looked very tired."

MORE PROGRESSIVE SUCCESSOR?

In Saint Peter's Square in the Vatican City, tourists struggled to absorb the news.

"In a religious post the mission should come from God so obviously for us Catholics it has shocked us, it must be because of his health because if not, it is inexplicable," said Sergio Calabrese, a visitor from Sicily.

Benedict attended World Youth Day in Cologne straight after his election, and received a warm welcome when he returned a year later to his largely Catholic home region of Bavaria.

But a 2011 visit to eastern Germany was dogged by demonstrations, coming after a torrent of headlines about sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests.

Largely due to that scandal, more than 181,000 German Catholics left the church in 2010, followed by more than 126,000 the following year, cutting the total number of German Catholics to 24.47 million.

For many of them, Ratzinger was too socially conservative in his previous post enforcing Vatican dogma as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and as pope.

The German media was never as critical as some of the Anglo-Saxon press, which dubbed him "God's Rottweiler" and "Nazinger" because of his brief, involuntary membership in the Hitler Youth and military service in World War Two, when he was drafted from the seminary.

But Benedict's papacy gave rise to much dissent in the German church and he never enjoyed the wild popularity of the arguably more conservative John Paul II, whose anti-communism was credited with helping to bring down the Berlin Wall.

Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger, who has fought for the right for women to become priests and was excommunicated by Cardinal Ratzinger in 2002, told Reuters she admired the pope's "mettle" for admitting he was too old to go on.

But she hoped for a successor who would treat men and women equally, allowing both to be ordained. "A pope who takes no action on this is lost from the very start," she said.

"Overall I think he was a reasonable pope, he came after a figure who was much loved. I hope he is replaced by someone who is more progressive," said a Catholic man outside St Hedwig's in Berlin, who declined to give his name.

The critical German lay movement "Wir sind Kirche" (We are the Church) said it was essential to choose a successor "who can tackle the polarization within the Church".

"We need a pope who represents the global Church, as ever more Catholics live outside of Europe," said the movement's spokesman Christian Weisner. "The biggest problem within the Church today is the Roman Curia, a center of power, and which for any pope is a huge challenge."

Benedict's resignation was met with incredulity at Munich's Frauenkirche Cathedral, where he was bishop from 1977 to 1982.

"That is a total surprise," said Andrea Wormsdorf, who said she felt "confused and dismayed".

Another churchgoer asked it was a festive prank on German carnival's "Pink Monday".

(Additional reporting by Jens Hack in Marktl, Noah Barkin and Erik Kirschbaum in Berlin, Emma Pinedo in Madrid, Hannah Rantala and Cristiano Corvino; Writing by Stephen Brown; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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Did medieval predecessor inspire Pope's retirement?

LONDON (Reuters) - Pope Benedict XVI gazed out on the crowd packing the piazza of a small Italian town. Below him lay the bones of Celestine V, the last pontiff to choose to retire; above rose sunlit crags where the "hermit pope" took refuge from a troubled mediaeval world.

A few weeks after that visit in July 2010 to Sulmona, in the Abruzzo mountains, the then 83-year-old Benedict told a fellow German he would not hesitate to become the first pope since Celestine in 1294 to resign of his own free will, if he was no longer able - "physically, psychologically and spiritually" - to meet the demands of running the billion-strong Catholic Church.

Did the example of Celestine's "Great Refusal" inspire his ageing successor to consider the alternative to death in office?

The working day Benedict spent in Sulmona, on July 4, 2010, was part of a typically busy schedule for the leader of one of the world's great faiths; he met hundreds of people and said mass for the 800th birthday of Pietro Angelerio, a monk who lived in local caves before and after his five troubled months as Pope Celestine V during a conflict between Church factions.

Some of Benedict's words that day may in retrospect betray a sense of weariness and a longing for a cloistered retirement.

In a homily to the crowd of 10,000 in the main square, he said: "A beautiful expression of St. Paul ... is also a perfect spiritual portrait of St. Peter Celestine: 'Far be it from me to glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.'"

Later, meeting young people at Sulmona cathedral, where a mosaic showing Benedict with Celestine was unveiled, he praised those with the courage of conviction and recalled the pope whose rejection of the Holy See was seen by some as sinful:

"St. Celestine V," he said, "Was able to act according to his conscience in obedience to God, hence without fear and with great courage even in difficult moments ... not fearing to lose his dignity but knowing that it consists in existing in truth."

He also defended Celestine's retreat into seclusion: "In his choice of the hermit life might there not have been individualism or an escape from responsibility? This temptation does of course exist. But in the experiences approved by the Church, the solitary life of prayer and penance is always at the service of the community, open to others," Benedict said.

"Hermits and monasteries are oases and sources of spiritual life from which all may draw."

"ONE CAN RESIGN"

Three weeks after his Sunday in Sulmona, the pope was taking his summer retreat at the papal residence at Castelgandolfo, in the hills outside Rome, and spent hours talking to German journalist Peter Seewald between July 26 and 31.

As recorded in Seewald's book of conversations "Light of the World", the former Joseph Ratzinger was asked whether he might resign in the face of criticism over his handling of sexual abuse by priests: "When the danger is great one must not run away," he said. "Now is certainly not the time to resign.

"One can resign at a peaceful moment, or when one simply cannot go on," he added. "If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign."

Celestine's founding of a great monastic order, his humility and piety, at a time when the Holy See was prey to the self-serving ambitions of Europe's kings, earned him sainthood, even though some called his resignation at the age of about 80 a betrayal of God. A figure condemned to the antechamber of hell in Dante's poem "Inferno" is sometimes identified as Celestine.

Most today would sympathize with his plight, however, and with the torment in Rome that drove him to renounce the papacy; in resigning, Celestine cited "legitimate reasons of humility and the weakness of my body" for seeking to recover "the consolations of my former life and lost tranquility".

Or as his successor put it 719 years later, also in Latin: "My strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry ... I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter.

"I wish to also devotedly serve the Holy Church of God in the future through a life dedicated to prayer."

Celestine survived only 18 months after stepping down, dying imprisoned by his successor who feared him as a rival. Some suspect he might even have been killed. Benedict will go to Castelgandolfo, then live in a convent inside the Vatican walls.

(Editing by Peter Graff)

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Pope avoids predecessor's show of suffering

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The closest of confidants, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger watched from the front row as Pope John Paul II, once a strapping athlete, steadily deteriorated in his later years.

John Paul, burdened by Parkinson's disease and crippling hip ailments, could no longer walk or talk at the time of his death in 2005 at 84 — a picture of suffering that moved the faithful while presenting a disturbing vision of papal frailty. The physical ordeal also left John Paul distracted from the challenges the church was facing, including the global priest sex abuse scandal.

Ratzinger, elected as Pope Benedict XVI, was at 78 the oldest pope in 300 years. With his resignation, it is clear that he has sought to spare the church another agonizing end — and, in the process, perhaps help the church keep pace with the realities of modern-day medicine.

In his announcement, Benedict said his strength in recent months "has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me."

In the church, bishops are forced to resign at the age of 75, and cardinals over 80 are barred from voting in a conclave to elect a new pope. It's only popes who are expected to rule for life. Now, the first papal resignation in 600 years could help set a modern precedent ensuring that popes, like other leaders with crushing responsibilities, have the mental and physical vigor to carry out the job.

Paris Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois said Benedict "broke a taboo."

"He broke away from several centuries of practice," the cardinal said, "and expressed the view that it wasn't just legitimate but probably useful for a pope to renounce and withdraw from his duties"

"In any event, it's a liberating act for the future ... For the century to come I think that none of Benedict XVI's successors will feel morally obliged to remain until their death," the French prelate said.

Milan Cardinal Angelo Scola, considered a top candidate to succeed Benedict, endorsed that view. "It is, as he said, for the good of the church," said Scola — although at age 71, he, too, would be an elderly pontiff if elected.

An examination of Benedict's thinking makes the decision less of a surprise.

Back in 2004, then Cardinal Ratzinger said he would not rule out term limits in the future. In an interview with an Italian religious affairs magazine, he said that with people living longer "one also could consider new norms."

Then, in a 2010 interview with German journalist Peter Sewald, Benedict took an unambiguous stand on whether a pope could resign.

"Yes. If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign," Benedict said.

Gunther Simmermacher, who has been editor for decades of the Southern Cross, a Catholic magazine published in South Africa, said that while Benedict has hinted at such a possibility, the news came as a surprise "even for people ensconced at the Vatican."

He recounted speaking by phone Monday morning with an official in the Vatican, and "having pleasant small talk with not a hint of this (resignation)."

The Rev. Thomas Reese, a Vatican expert, said that most modern popes have felt that resignation is unacceptable. Although church law has long accepted the possibility, popes fear setting precedents that could encourage factions to pressure for resignations for reasons other than health.

Pope Paul VI, pontiff from 1963 until his death in 1978, summed up the view now being challenged by Benedict by famously saying: "Paternity cannot be resigned."

___

AP correspondents Michelle Faul in South Africa, and Thomas Adamson in Paris contributed to this report.

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Pope resignation leaves Catholic world in shock

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict left the Catholic world in shock after becoming the first pontiff since the Middle Ages to resign his office, saying that failing strength had left him unable to lead the church through a period of relentless change and turmoil.

The 85-year-old pontiff announced his abdication as leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics in a speech delivered in Latin, the universal language of the church, to cardinals meeting in the Vatican's Apostolic Palace.

"I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to the adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry," he said, referring to the tradition that dates the papacy back to Saint Peter, 2,000 years ago.

He will continue in office until 1900 GMT on February 28 before stepping down to allow the election of a new pope, which Vatican officials said was expected to come by the start of the Holy Week on March 24.

He is expected to spend some time at the pope's summer residence near Rome before retiring to spend his final years in a cloistered convent in the Vatican, and will play no part in selecting his successor.

Famously known as "God's Rottweiler" before his election in 2005, Benedict fought against the spread of materialist values in society and strongly opposed any relaxation of the church's traditional strictures against contraception, homosexual acts or women priests.

His eight years in office were overshadowed by scandals ranging from the sexual abuse of children by priests to the arrest of his own butler for stealing confidential papal documents in the so-called "Vatileaks" affair.

The pope said he had left "with full freedom" and Church officials were at pains to stress that the running of the Church would not be affected by his unexpected departure, which surprised even close aides.

While his surprise decision was greeted with respectful tributes from world leaders including U.S. President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, some others underlined the problems which blighted much of Benedict's time in office.

"I deeply respect the decision of Pope Benedict XVI, especially since it is not in line with tradition," said Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council and himself a Catholic. "His pontificate has been short but very difficult."

WHITE SMOKE

The complex machinery to choose a successor will move into gear, opening the way for the conclave of cardinals whose decision will be announced with the release of white smoke from a chimney in the Sistine Chapel.

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 now accounts for 42 percent of the world's Catholics.

"It could be time for a black pope, or a yellow one, or a red one, or a Latin American," said Guatemala's Archbishop Oscar Julio Vian Morales after Benedict's announcement.

After Benedict's relatively brief papacy, which followed the 27-year pontificate of John Paul II, the cardinals may also be inclined to choose a younger man than Benedict, who was 78 when he was elected.

Whoever is appointed will have to deal with regional issues and the tension between conservative Catholics who have supported Benedict's strictly traditional doctrinal line and others who feel he has stifled change and development.

"In Europe, the Church is seeking a new relationship to society. In many countries in Asia and Africa, it is experiencing an incredible expansion," Archbishop of Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn said.

Benedict himself had a mixed record in dealing with cultures outside his own, triggering fury among Muslims with a speech critical of Islam in 2006 and angering many in Africa by opposing the use of condoms to combat the scourge of AIDS.

Never as popular as the widely beloved John Paul, Benedict was a scholarly theologian with little of the shrewd political instinct which elevated his predecessor to the front rank of world statesmen.

His decision to leave office shocked some Catholics, who felt that a pope should stay in office until the end of his life, and his exit will leave the Church with both a retired and a serving pope for the first time in hundreds of years.

The last pope to leave office willingly was Celestine V, a saintly hermit who served only a few months before abdicating in December, 1294. Another pope, Gregory XII reluctantly abdicated in 1415 to end a dispute with a rival claimant to the papacy.

(Editing by Peter Graff)

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Pope's sudden resignation sends shockwaves through Church

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict stunned the Roman Catholic Church on Monday when he announced he would stand down, the first pope to do so in 700 years, saying he no longer had the mental and physical strength to carry on.

Church officials tried to relay a climate of calm confidence in the running of a 2,000-year-old institution, but the decision could lead to uncertainty in a Church already besieged by scandal for covering up sexual abuse of children by priests.

The soft-spoken German, who always maintained that he never wanted to be pope, was an uncompromising conservative on social and theological issues, fighting what he regarded as the increasing secularization of society.

It remains to be seen whether his successor will continue such battles or do more to bend with the times.

Despite his firm opposition to tolerance of homosexual acts, his eight year reign saw gay marriage accepted in many countries. He has staunchly resisted allowing women to be ordained as priests, and opposed embryonic stem cell research, although he retreated slightly from the position that condoms could never be used to fight AIDS.

He repeatedly apologized for the Church's failure to root out child abuse by priests, but critics said he did too little and the efforts failed to stop a rapid decline in Church attendance in the West, especially in his native Europe.

In addition to child sexual abuse crises, his papacy saw the Church rocked by Muslim anger after he compared Islam to violence. Jews were upset over rehabilitation of a Holocaust denier. During a scandal over the Church's business dealings, his butler was accused of leaking his private papers.

In an announcement read to cardinals in Latin, the universal language of the Church, the 85-year-old said: "Well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of St Peter ...

"As from 28 February 2013, at 20:00 hours (1900 GMT) the See of Rome, the See of St. Peter will be vacant and a conclave to elect the new Supreme Pontiff will have to be convoked by those whose competence it is."

POPE DOESN'T FEAR SCHISM

Benedict is expected to go into isolation for at least a while after his resignation. Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said Benedict did not intend to influence the decision of the cardinals in a secret conclave to elect a successor.

A new leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics could be elected as soon as Palm Sunday, on March 24, and be ready to take over by Easter a week later, Lombardi said.

Several popes in the past, including Benedict's predecessor John Paul, have refrained from stepping down over their health, because of the division that could be caused by having an "ex-pope" and a reigning pope alive at the same time.

Lombardi said the pope did not fear a possible "schism", with Catholics owing allegiances to a past and present pope in case of differences on Church teachings.

He indicated the complex machinery of the process to elect a new pope would move quickly because the Vatican would not have to wait until after the elaborate funeral services for a pope.

It is not clear if Benedict will have a public life after he resigns. Lombardi said Benedict would first go to the papal summer residence south of Rome and then move into a cloistered convent inside the Vatican walls.

The resignation means that cardinals from around the world will begin arriving in Rome in March and after preliminary meetings, lock themselves in a secret conclave and elect the new pope from among themselves in votes in the Sistine Chapel.

There has been growing pressure on the Church for it to choose a pope from the developing world to better reflect where most Catholics live and where the Church is growing.

"It could be time for a black pope, or a yellow one, or a red one, or a Latin American," said Guatemala's Archbishop Oscar Julio Vian Morales.

The cardinals may also want a younger man. John Paul was 58 when he was elected in 1978. Benedict was 20 years older.

"We have had two intellectuals in a row, two academics, perhaps it is time for a diplomat," said Father Tom Reese, senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University. "Rather than electing the smartest man in the room, they should elect the man who will listen to all the other smart people in the Church."

Liberals have already begun calling for a pope that would be more open to reform.

"The current system remains an 'old boy's club' and does not allow for women's voices to participate in the decision of the next leader of our Church," said the Women's Ordination Conference, a group that wants women to be able to be priests.

"GREAT COURAGE"

The last pope to resign willingly was Celestine V in 1294 after reigning for only five months, his resignation was known as "the great refusal" and was condemned by the poet Dante in the "Divine Comedy". Gregory XII reluctantly abdicated in 1415 to end a dispute with a rival claimant to the papacy.

Lombardi said Benedict's stepping aside showed "great courage". He ruled out any specific illness or depression and said the decision was made in the last few months "without outside pressure". But the decision was not without controversy.

"This is disconcerting, he is leaving his flock," said Alessandra Mussolini, a parliamentarian who is granddaughter of Italy's wartime dictator. "The pope is not any man. He is the vicar of Christ. He should stay on to the end, go ahead and bear his cross to the end. This is a huge sign of world destabilization that will weaken the Church."

Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, secretary to the late Pope John Paul, said the former pope had stayed on despite failing health for the last decade of his life as he believed "you cannot come down from the cross."

While the pope had slowed down recently - he started using a cane and a wheeled platform to take him up the long aisle in St Peter's Square - he had given no hint recently that he was considering such a dramatic decision.

Elected in 2005 to succeed the enormously popular John Paul, Benedict never appeared to feel comfortable in the job.

"MIND AND BODY"

In his announcement, the pope told the cardinals that in order to govern "... both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me."

Before he was elected pope, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was known as "God's rottweiler" for his stern stand on theological issues. After a few months, he showed a milder side but he never drew the kind of adulation that had marked the 27-year papacy of his predecessor John Paul.

U.S. President Barack Obama extended prayers to Benedict and best wishes to those who would choose his successor.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the pope's decision must be respected if he feels he is too weak to carry out his duties. British Prime Minister David Cameron said: "He will be missed as a spiritual leader to millions."

The Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of the worldwide Anglican communion, said he had learned of the pope's decision with a heavy heart but complete understanding.

CHEERS AND SCANDAL

Elected to the papacy on April 19, 2005, Benedict ruled over a slower-paced, more cerebral and less impulsive Vatican.

But while conservatives cheered him for trying to reaffirm traditional Catholic identity, his critics accused him of turning back the clock on reforms by nearly half a century and hurting dialogue with Muslims, Jews and other Christians.

After appearing uncomfortable in the limelight at the start, he began feeling at home with his new job and showed that he intended to be pope in his way.

Despite great reverence for his charismatic, globe-trotting predecessor -- whom he put on the fast track to sainthood and whom he beatified in 2011 -- aides said he was determined not to change his quiet manner to imitate John Paul's style.

A quiet, professorial type who relaxed by playing the piano, he showed the gentle side of a man who was the Vatican's chief doctrinal enforcer for nearly a quarter of a century.

The first German pope for some 1,000 years and the second non-Italian in a row, he traveled regularly, making about four foreign trips a year, but never managed to draw the oceanic crowds of his predecessor.

The child abuse scandals hounded most of his papacy. He ordered an official inquiry into abuse in Ireland, which led to the resignation of several bishops.

Scandal from a source much closer to home hit in 2012 when the pontiff's butler, responsible for dressing him and bringing him meals, was found to be the source of leaked documents alleging corruption in the Vatican's business dealings.

Benedict confronted his own country's past when he visited the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz. Calling himself "a son of Germany", he prayed and asked why God was silent when 1.5 million victims, most of them Jews, were killed there.

Ratzinger served in the Hitler Youth during World War Two when membership was compulsory. He was never a member of the Nazi party and his family opposed Adolf Hitler's regime.

(Additional reporting by James Mackenzie, Barry Moody, Cristiano Corvino, Alexandra Hudson in Berlin, and Dagamara Leszkowixa in Poland; Editing by Peter Graff)

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Catholics surprised at pope's decision to retire

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Shock, sadness and declarations of faith met Pope Benedict XVI's announcement Monday that he would retire Feb. 28. It also sparked reflection about what kind of pontiff should replace him. Here's a look at reaction from around the world:

UNITED STATES

At St. Andrew by the Bay in Annapolis, Maryland, the Rev. Jeffrey Dauses, said that as the world has changed, so have the demands on the papacy.

"It's not the world of the Middle Ages. It's not the world even of in the earlier part of this century when the pope pretty much stayed in Rome, did everything from Rome," Dauses said. "Nowadays with travel, with the expectations of an incredibly high profile, public life, he's not a young man. I mean, he's at an age where in our culture he would be taking it easy and resting, and we're expecting him to keep this grueling schedule as pope, and he simply had the ability to say, 'I can't do that.'"

In New Orleans, parishioner Alden Hagardorn said Benedict's decision to step down in the in the face of declining health was "a very bold and brave decision."

"It's something he didn't have to do," said Hagardorn, one of a group of Catholics who have tried to stop closure of churches amid the city's diminished population and financial losses following Hurricane Katrina.

HONDURAS:

Honduran Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga said he received the news of the pope's resignation "with great regret and much surprise."

"This is something completely new for the Catholic Church, though it was discussed during the illness of Pope John Paul II," the cardinal said. "I didn't know Pope Benedict XVI would make this decision, but the last time I talked to him he seemed physically tired. So I understand that the Holy Father has made this decision coherently and because he can't continue."

NORWAY:

Andreas Dingstad, a spokesman for the Catholic diocese in the Norwegian capital of Oslo, said it may be time for a "youngish" pope, possibly from the developing world.

"The church is growing most in the south. So I think lots of people will be ready for a pope from Africa, Asia or South America. But who knows, it's the early days still," Dingstad said.

SPAIN:

Spain's bishops are "affected and (feel) like orphans because of this decision that fills us with sorrow, because his rich teaching and his close paternity made us feel safe and enlightened," said Cardinal Antonio Rouco Varela, president of the Spanish Episcopal Conference.

PERU:

The president of Peru's Roman Catholic bishops, Msgr. Salvador Pineiro, said Benedict's successor "has to be a pope with much physical strength." He noted that believers had become accustomed to the energy of his successor John Paul II, who traveled widely.

"It would make me very happy if the new pope were a Latin American," he added in a telephone interview from the country's Huamanga-Ayacucho region. "Although in Africa, they will ask that he be an African, and those in Rome will ask for a Roman."

NIGERIA

The African nation with biggest Christian population, Nigeria, has some 20 million practicing Catholics. In Lagos, Nigeria's largest city, trader Chukwuma Awaegwu put his feelings simply Monday: "If I had my way an African should be the next pope, or someone from Nigeria."

"It's true they brought the religion to us, but we have come of age," he said. "In America, now we have a black president. So let's just feel the impact of a black pope."

ISRAEL:

Following the surprise resignation, Israeli leaders lauded Pope Benedict XVI as a friend.

One of Israel's two chief rabbis, Yona Metzger, said relations between the rabbinate and the Catholic Church "were the best ever" under Benedict. Israel's president, Shimon Peres, said the pope was a "clear voice against racism and anti-Semitism."

IRAQ:

Louis Sako, the Iraq-based leader of the Chaldean Catholic Church, said the pope, in resigning, "is an example, when we cannot serve, to let another one do better." Sako met with the pope last week and said he noticed then how tired the pontiff seemed.

PORTUGAL

Antonio Marto, the bishop of Fatima in central Portugal, said Benedict resignation presents an opportunity to pick a church leader from a country outside Europe.

"Europe today is going through a period of cultural tiredness, exhaustion, which is reflected in the way Christianity is lived," Marto told reporters. "You don't see that in Africa or Latin America where there is a freshness, an enthusiasm about living the faith.

"Perhaps we need a pope who can look beyond Europe and bring to the entire church a certain vitality that is seen on other continents."

SWEDEN:

Anders Arborelius, the bishop of Stockholm's Catholic diocese, said the resignation would likely make it more common for future popes to step down when they feel old and frail. "It will probably be a new trend," he said.

Arborelius also said the new pope would probably not be a European.

"A lot suggests that it will be someone from another continent," he said. "The Church's center of gravity has moved from the West to the southern hemisphere."

SOUTH AFRICA:

Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of South Africa told The Associated Press "I think we would have a better chance of getting someone outside of the northern hemisphere this time, because there are some really promising cardinals from other parts of the world.

"It's a question of where is the kind of (and) the quality of leadership evident at the moment: Coming from a growing background rather than a holding or a maintenance background?"

FRANCE:

French President Francois Hollande said Benedict's decision "stirs the greatest respect" and praised the pope "for all the efforts he led in support of peace."

"It's a courageous and exceptional decision," he said.

BRITAIN:

British Prime Minister David Cameron told lawmakers in Parliament that Benedict "has worked tirelessly to strengthen Britain's relations with the Holy See and his visit to Britain in 2010 is remembered with great respect and affection."

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