thanking Pope Benedict XVI

Today we gather to offer this mass in thanksgiving to God for the person of Pope Benedict XVI who served the church as Pope, the successor of Peter for seven years, ten months and ten days.  Elected to the papacy after the death of Pope John Paul II, and after only four rounds of voting, Pope Benedict tendered his resignation last February 11 effective February 28 at 8 PM.  In Philippine time that would mean Pope Benedict XVI would no longer be pope starting tomorrow at 3:30 AM.  From that time on he will be called His Holiness Benedict the XVI, the Pope Emeritus.  He will still wear the white cassock but without the cape.  And he will no longer wear his signature red shoes but he will wear the brown shoes which were given to him by the people of Mexico during his visit there. 

At 5:30 PM Roman time he will be brought by helicopter to Castel Gandolfo, the summer residence of the popes perched on a hill overlooking the sea where he will stay for the meantime that his permanent residence which is a monastery of nuns inside the Vatican is undergoing repair.  Then in Castel Gandolfo at exactly 8:00 PM, Benedict will hand over the rings he wore for more than seven years to the Carmelenggo, the so called the fisherman’s ring, and the carmelengo, the chancellor, will destroy it, smash it with a hammer and then he will say "sede vacante," the see is now vacant. Then the Swiss Guards who have committed themselves to guard the pope with their own lives, will leave Benedict XVI in Castel Gandolfo.  They will head back to Rome leaving Benedict behind because he is no longer pope and he is no longer their responsibility.  In Rome the Swiss Guards will wait for the next pope. 

That’s more or less the ritual they will observe tomorrow.  Today we thank God for Benedict’s service in the church.  He was elected on the 19^th of April 2005.  Before that he was the Cardinal Head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, the so called watch-dog of the pope, nagapamantay kon sin-o ang nagatudlo sang sala nga pagtuluohan.  That is why he earned the nickname God’s Rottweiler  and also the German Shepherd.  Sia ni ang nagapang-excommunicate, ang nagapang-punish sa mga pari kon nakasala sila ilabi na gid sa ila ginatudlo.  So that was his reputation, added to the fact that he seldom smiles, pirme lang nagaduko, pirme lang daw nahuya.  But nobody ever questioned his brilliance, maalam gid man sia.  You read his books, you read his encyclicals, his apostolic letters and his sermons – may unod gid so much so that many times it would be very hard for you to finish his book because at every paragraph you feel the need to stop and reflect on the implications of what he is saying.  And it is not some ideas floating like air, but his ideas are practical, his ideas have practical applications.  This was also the observation to Time Magazine many years ago when it said, “during the time of Pope John Paul II people came to Rome to see him, but during the time of Pope Benedict  XVI people came to Rome to listen to him, to listen to what he will say.”  Well Pope John Paul II was an actor, but Pope Benedict is a theologian and a teacher.  That is why the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Cameroon said in thanking the pope , “Thank you Holy Father for making us stop and think.”  The context of this statement was the lectures Benedict gave to the British Parliament, to the Bundestag or the German Parliament and also to the United Nations and the University of Regensburg.  These were great lectures that were given a rousing standing ovation never before seen in very secular parliaments, for there he argued on the relationship of culture and faith, of the importance of reason and of the relationship of the church and the secular world.  Even his short catechesis during papal audiences – the Sunday Angelus and the Wednesday audiences are all worth listening to and studying closely.  He has only three encyclicals but these are all worth reading – you have Deus Caritas, then Spe Salvi, and Caritas in Veritate.  You should read these.

Yet despite his intellectual abilities he is a humble person, very humble.  One of the greatest problems which he encountered and has burdened him greatly was the sexual abuse committed by priests.  And yet he carried it all and he even met with victims of priests in Australia and in the US.  He listened to them and he even cried upon hearing their sufferings.  And he asked pardon from them in behalf of those priests. 

Today he is leaving the Papacy.  We thank him so much for carrying us through these difficult times.  We may be a bit disturbed by this decision but as he himself said, the Lord is in the barque,  the boat of Peter, the church is called the barque.  And he continued, I have felt like St. Peter with the Apostles in the boat on the Sea of ​​Galilee: the Lord has given us many days of sunshine and gentle breeze, days in which the catch has been abundant; [then] there have been times when the seas were rough and the wind against us, as in the whole history of the Church it has ever been - and the Lord seemed to sleep. Nevertheless, I always knew that the Lord is in the barque, the barque of the Church is not mine, not ours, but His - and He shall not let her sink. It is He, who steers her.

So that’s it.  The church is the church of Jesus.  Jesus will guide it.  He will steer it, He shall not let her sink.  Thank you Pope Benedict.  Thank you for serving the church.  Bless us and pray for us.  Pray also that we will be given a Pope who will affirm us in the faith and will lead us to heaven.