The death of Benedict XVI paves the way for the resignation of Franciscowho until this Saturday had governed the Church always under the watchful eye and with the close presence of his immediate predecessor. Jorge bergoglio He has serious mobility problems and his desire to leave if he is unable to carry out his work, as he considered, is public. Joseph Ratzinger in 2013, but Ratzinger, apart from being an example, could be an obstacle. If there was only one precedent and a very distant one for papa emeritus, it was unimaginable to propose two.
[Joseph Ratzinger, el Papa de la ortodoxia cristiana que no pudo con el peso de la púrpura]
Benedict XVI was the first pontiff in 600 years to retire, serving more years as emeritus than in office, and Francis has always seen the move as smart as well as an opportunity as he has seen his state worsen. He stated as far back as 2013 that he would like the resignation to be normalized and later, and has on several occasions suggested that his pontificate would be brief. “The door is open and it would not be a catastrophe,” he said on a recent and well-remembered flight back to Rome after a trip to Canada. It is the trips that make him most aware of his state.
On March 13, 2023, Francisco, 86, will celebrate a decade since that white smoke in Saint Peter’s Square that made him the 266th Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church. According to specialized press, it would be after a key synod of bishops in autumn when Bergoglio, already with a very reduced agenda abroad, could consider breaking the news.
His visit to Celestine V
Since the visit to Canada in July, he has used a wheelchair and a walker to get around after injuring ligaments in his right knee earlier in the year, added to sciatica. In 2021, Francisco, who lost a kidney at the age of 21, underwent scheduled colon surgery that kept him hospitalized for ten days.
In August, Bergoglio starred in a highly symbolic act in this regard, visiting the tomb of Celestine V, the first pope to voluntarily resign, in 1294. Francis did not speak during the hours he remained in L’Aquila, the capital of the Italian region of Abruzzo, a hundred kilometers from Rome and to which the pontiff arrived by helicopter from the Vatican.
It was on February 11, 2013 when Benedict XVI announced his new condition, which required a conclave to choose his successor: “After repeatedly examining my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that, due to advanced age, I no longer I have the strength to adequately exercise the Petrine ministry”. Next Thursday, January 5, Francisco will officiate at his funeral.
