Top German Bishop honours former Pope Benedict, but says "he left stumbling stones"

Record ID: 1704795

  • Title: Top German Bishop honours former Pope Benedict, but says "he left stumbling stones"
  • Date: 31st December 2022
  • Summary: BAETZING DURING PRAYER AND WRITING HIS CONDOLENCES IN BOOK VARIOUS OF BAETZING WRITING
  • Embargoed: 14th January 2023 13:37
  • Keywords: Benedict Benedikt Bischofskonferenz Bishop Pope Death
  • Location: LIMBURG, GERMANY
  • City: LIMBURG, GERMANY
  • Country: Germany
  • Topics: Europe,Religion/Belief,Society/Social Issues
  • Reuters ID: LVA004970331122022RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: German politicians and church leaders mourned the death of former Pope Benedict on Saturday (December 31), hailing his importance to his homeland as Germany's first pontiff in 1,000 years.
    "Today is a day of mourning, of farewell, but for me personally even more one of gratitude and respect for a great man of the Church," said Georg Baetzing, who is bishop of Limburg and head of the German Bishops' Conference. Describing him as a brilliant theologian, Baetzing said Benedict was nonetheless humble and cautious - not born to take the stage but rather to reflect on the considerations of faith. However, Baetzing made reference to a report on sexual abuse in institutions of the Church.
    In January 2022, an independent report in Benedict's native Germany alleged that he had failed to take action in four cases when he was Archbishop of Munich between 1977 and 1982. The frail former pope acknowledged in an emotional personal letter that errors had occurred and asked for forgiveness. His lawyers argued in a detailed rebuttal that he was not directly to blame.
    Child abuse scandals hounded most of his papacy but he is credited with jump-starting the process to discipline or defrock predator priests after a more lax attitude under John Paul II. He ordered an inquiry into abuse in Ireland, which led to the resignation of several bishops. He disciplined the late Father Marcial Maciel, founder of the Catholic order the Legionaries of Christ and one of the Church's most notorious predators. The Vatican under Pope John Paul II had failed to take action against Maciel despite overwhelming evidence of his crimes.
    Benedict, who died earlier on Saturday aged 95, resigned in 2013, the first pontiff in 600 years to do so. Explaining the shock decision, Benedict said he was too old and frail to lead the Roman Catholic Church and its more than 1.3 billion members. Born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger on April 16, 1927, in the Bavarian village of Marktl, Benedict became a priest in 1951 and succeeded Pope John Paul II following his death in 2005.
    (Production: Timm Reichert, Susanne Neumayer-Remter, Hung Trinh)
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