RATZINGER - BENEDETTO XVI

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The various forms of the dissolution of matrimony today, like free unions, trial marriages and going up to pseudo-matrimonies by people of the same sex, are rather expressions of an anarchic freedom that wrongly passes for true freedom of man . While visiting Brazil in May 2007, "the pope sparked controversy by saying that native populations had been 'silently longing' for the Christian faith brought to South America by colonizers. He took as his episcopal motto Cooperatores veritatis ( Latin for 'cooperators of the truth'), [56] from the Third Epistle of John, [57] a choice on which he commented in his autobiographical work Milestones.

The same day, Matteo Bruni, the director of the Holy See Press Office, stated that "in the last few hours there has been an aggravation of [Benedict's] health due to advancing age" and that he was under medical care.During his visit to Brazil in 2007, Benedict presided over the canonization of Frei Galvão on 11 May, while George Preca, founder of the Malta-based MUSEUM, Szymon of Lipnica, Charles of Mount Argus, and Marie-Eugénie de Jésus were canonized in a ceremony held at the Vatican on 3 June 2007. The Dalai Lama congratulated Benedict XVI upon his election, [164] and visited him in October 2006 in Vatican City.

His resignation was the first by a pope since Gregory XII in 1415, and the first on a pope's initiative since Celestine V in 1294. The Secret of Love, According to Benedict XVI – Pope Explains Encyclical to Readers of Italian Magazine". Welby referred to the former pope as "one of the greatest theologians of his age", while Kirill praised conciliatory efforts undertaken between the Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches during Benedict's pontificate.

Benedict wrote three encyclicals: Deus caritas est (Latin for "God is Love"), Spe salvi ("Saved by Hope"), and Caritas in veritate ("Love in Truth"). Benedict apologized for any offence he had caused and made a point of visiting Turkey, a predominantly Muslim country, and praying in its Blue Mosque. In his first encyclical, Deus caritas est, he said that a human being, created in the image of God who is love, can practice love: to give himself to God and others ( agape) by receiving and experiencing God's love in contemplation.

In his message for the 50th anniversary of the founding of the International Atomic Energy Agency, he confirmed: "The Holy See, fully approving of the IAEA's goal, has been a member from the organisation's foundation and continues to support its activity. He then made an appearance at the canonization mass of Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, greeting the cardinals and Francis. He said "something like a human ecology" was needed, and added: "Rain forests deserve indeed to be protected, but no less so does man. Despite the more secure setting, Benedict was victim to security risks several times inside Vatican City. In 2019, Benedict released a 6,000-word letter that attributed the Church's sexual abuse crisis to an erosion of morality driven by secularization and the sexual revolution of the 1960s.On 22 December 2008, Benedict gave an end-of-year message to the Roman Curia in which he talked about gender and the important distinction between men and women. Honours and awards In 2013, one of Notre-Dame de Paris' new bells was named Benoît-Joseph after Benedict. Benedict also emphasised that "Only creative reason, which in the crucified God is manifested as love, can really show us the way. During Benedict's inaugural Mass, the previous custom of every cardinal submitting to the pope was replaced by being greeted by twelve people, including cardinals, clergy, religious, a married couple and their child, and some who were newly confirmed people; the cardinals had formally sworn their obedience upon the election of the new pontiff. The decision was controversial and widely criticized by conservative and traditionalist Catholics as lacking in charity and an attack on those attached to the liturgical patrimony of the Church.

Following his election in April 2005 there were several rumours about the Pope's health, but none of them were confirmed. At the same time, Corbinian's bear, as God's beast of burden, symbolizes the weight of office that Benedict carried.The journalist Charlotte Allen described Benedict as "the pope of aesthetics": "He has reminded a world that looks increasingly ugly and debased that there is such a thing as the beautiful – whether it's embodied in a sonata or an altarpiece or an embroidered cope or the cut of a cassock – and that earthly beauty ultimately communicates a beauty that is beyond earthly things.