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POPE BENEDICT XVI has held his final public event before stepping down as pontiff, using his final general audience to further explain his reasons for deciding to step down.
Thousands turned out at St Peter’s Square in Rome to mark the 85-year-old pope’s final public event, before he retires to his summer residence outside Rome tomorrow and ends his pontificate at 7pm tomorrow evening.
The Wednesday morning general audience usually offers a platform for the pope to give lectures on the nature of Christianity – but today Benedict instead used the opportunity to elaborate on his reasons for his retirement.
Benedict said he did not have the “strength of mind or body” to continue leading the Catholic Church’s 1.2 billion followers.
“To love the church means also to have the courage to take difficult, painful decisions, always keeping the good of the church in mind, not oneself,” he said, further recalling the doubts he had about his ability to rise to the role when he was appointed pontiff in April 2005.
“I have had moments of joy and light, but also moments that haven’t been easy … moments of turbulent seas and rough winds,” he added.
At the conclusion of his remarks, Benedict toured the square in the ‘Popemobile’, greeting well-wishers in what amounted to his final public appearance as head of the Roman Catholic Church.
Most of the 115 cardinals who will vote in next month’s conclave, appointing a successor to Benedict, were present for the audience – which had an expected attendance of about 50,000, but an actual turnout of nearly double that much.
Tomorrow morning Benedict will hold a meeting with the cardinals, before flying to Castel Gandolfo – about 40 minutes away by road – to see out the last hours of his pontificate.
At 8pm Roman time (7pm Irish time) the doors of the residence will close, and the Swiss Guards protecting him will stand down – their job of protecting the head of the Catholic Church over for the time being.
https://soundcloud.com/thejournal_gav/pope-benedicts-last-address
Readers unable to view the Soundcloud file above can click here to listen to the audio.
Dear Brothers and Sisters,I offer a warm and affectionate greeting to the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors who have joined me for this, my last General Audience.
Like Saint Paul, whose words we heard earlier, my heart is filled with thanksgiving to God who ever watches over his Church and her growth in faith and love, and I embrace all of you with joy and gratitude.
During this Year of Faith, we have been called to renew our joyful trust in the Lord’s presence in our lives and in the life of the Church. I am personally grateful for his unfailing love and guidance in the eight years since I accepted his call to serve as the Successor of Peter.
I am also deeply grateful for the understanding, support and prayers of so many of you, not only here in Rome, but also throughout the world.
The decision I have made, after much prayer, is the fruit of a serene trust in God’s will and a deep love of Christ’s Church. I will continue to accompany the Church with my prayers, and I ask each of you to pray for me and for the new Pope.
In union with Mary and all the saints, let us entrust ourselves in faith and hope to God, who continues to watch over our lives and to guide the journey of the Church and our world along the paths of history.
I commend all of you, with great affection, to his loving care, asking him to strengthen you in the hope which opens our hearts to the fullness of life that he alone can give.
To you and your families, I impart my blessing.
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Is this like jobsbridge but overseas?
How many billions have the countries mentioned spent on arms and wars in the past few decades alone?
There are thousands of Irish families in severe need, get that sorted before looking overseas for people to help.
we need all our volunteers at home to try and sort our own country out,could we just curtail the do gooding for a while,i think at this stage we are not respected for all our relentless do gooding we do,,we are probably look on as fools in some quarters.
What? Volunteering to help the worlds poorest is a bad thing? Encouraging people to expand their horizons and to help others, while doing good is bad?
Noel we have many volunteers in this country, I’m in my final year studying community development with little job prospects at the min of a job in what I’d like to. I’d rather use my 4 years education in overseas development as a volunteer and gain experience as in Ireland if I were to volunteer in this kind of work people would be saying it’s job displacement which of course it is. Now you see my situation which of the two is more beneficial to me and the community here and overseas, a year overseas working and developing my professional skills or be another statistic on the live register
Large scale aid, corruption, mass immigration along with the other globalisation policy of fractional reserve banking foisted onto the 3rd world thereby creating a massive debt burden have a lot to do with keeping Africa in poverty. The worst thing one can do is strip a country’s people of their will to fight, become resourceful or independent & siphon off the people who are most capable & energetic to effect that change. A draw down of aid, end to mass immigration, whilst fostering help in other ways would in the longer term end the cycle of constant impoverishment in the 3rd world.
How many billions in aid have we sent in addition to the above volunteer efforts for decades. Yet if indigenous Europeans wish to protect their ethnicities, protect their ethnic territories, they are told by the recipients of our generous never-ending aid, that we are evil & racist.
Volunteers me ar*e! They’ve been goin out foreign for the past 50 years and what have the done to help long term??? Nothing!! Leave them fend for themselves for once and they might start getting off their arses and help themselves!
Charity begins at home!
The immigration industry & Immigrant Council of Ireland have deemed your comment to be racist. You are being investigated for hate-speech & thought-crime.
Volunteer my arse, for what? To make some CEO a nice bonus on the back of my hard work or provide a nice election setup to a candidate claiming my work. Thats what it is really about. money ,power ,political movement, not helping people.
Some very disappointing negative opinions around volunteering. I had the pleasure of volunteering in Malawi in a clinical professional capacity for almost 6 months in 2012/13. The opportunity was very worthwhile and I believe one grows and matures in many ways from the experience. I self-funded this time away. Many are unaware that volunteering is very costly. Including opportunity cost and actual costs of flight and daily expenses I estimated that it costed €30,000 for 6 months. On this basis might it be worthwhile that the Irish government perhaps contribute less financially to individual countries but support individuals who wish to go to these countries? Additionally, I would like by law (similar to mat leave) job protection for individuals who volunteer in developing countries. In other words if an employee wants to volunteer abroad the same job protection right are afforded as a female going on mat leave.
So true it ain’t like there’s too many jobs out at home
I am too self obsessed for the volunteering lark but at least I admit it.
Though I would gladly volunteer to help the needy in Australia providing I got my flight, food and accommodation all paid for me.
have your say