Pope Francis was the first to visit the body of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI in the Vatican’s Mater Ecclesiae monastery, where he had resided since his resignation in 2013, the Holy See confirmed on Sunday.
After the death, at 09:34 (0834 GMT), the personal secretary of the German pontiff, Georg Ganswein, telephoned Francis, according to Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni.
Francis arrived at the monastery about 10 minutes later and watched over his predecessor’s body until 10:00 a.m. local time (09:00 GMT), when he had to leave due to other commitments.
It was the Argentine Pope himself who this Wednesday publicly confirmed the seriousness of the state of health of Benedict XVI, who died on Saturday at the age of 95.
Although it was not Pope Francis who gave Benedict XVI the sacrament of extreme unction, he has publicly expressed his “thank you” to the emeritus pope and German theologian.
It fell to Ganswein, the closest aide to Benedict XVI in decades, to present the emeritus pope with the sacrament of last rites on Wednesday after a mass celebrated in his room.
Today, Pope Francis, who in almost 10 years of living together has visited Benedict XVI on several occasions, praising him and calling him “a wise grandfather”, has asked the faithful to pray in honor of the pope emeritus.
The funeral chapel will open on Monday in St. Peter’s Basilica so that people can bid farewell to Benedict XVI, remaining until Thursday.
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI shook the Church when he resigned his pontificate for health reasons on February 11, 2013, two months before his eighth year in office.
Joseph Ratzinger, who was Pope between 2005 and 2013, was born in 1927 in Marktl am Inn, in the German diocese of Passau, becoming the first German to head the Catholic Church in many centuries and a representative of the most dogmatic line of the Church. .
The sexual abuse of minors by priests and the “Vatileaks”, in which case confidential papal documents were revealed, were issues that stirred his pontificate.
Benedict XVI called the abuses a “heinous crime” and apologized to the victims. The funeral of Benedict XVI will take place on Thursday, in Saint Peter’s Square, in the Vatican, at 9:30 a.m. local time (8:30 a.m. in Lisbon), in a celebration presided over by Pope Francis.
Source: TSF
