When Pope Benedict resigned 10 years ago, it caused pandemonium

With stripped-down ceremony and fewer invited state delegations, the funeral for Pope Benedict XVI broke ground in Vatican protocol for a former pontiff, fittingly for a figure who will be remembered for establishing that popes need not die in office.

When the news broke of Benedict’s resignation in February 2013, I was a Rome-based reporter with Reuters, accredited with the Vatican’s press office to work from the press room of the Holy See within the walls of the city state.

In events that have become famous in Italy, veteran vaticanista reporter Giovanna Chirri of Italian newswire ANSA got the scoop because she studied Latin in school – the language in which Benedict, with no warning, gave the announcement.

Seated in his papal regalia on a gilded seat in the Consistory Hall of the Apostolic Palace, the pontiff told the gathered cardinals that, aside from a discussion about canonisations that was the expected topic of their meeting, he had something else to say of “great importance for the life of the Church”.

Pope Francis praises Benedict’s ‘acute and gentle thought’ on final day of lying in state

---

Resurrection of Jesus was a cosmic event. It remains an irresistible force

---

The Pope and LGBT Catholics: Francis faces a conservative backlash

---

Mary McAleese: Vatican authority over Catholics is ‘legally and morally questionable’

---

Reading from a piece of paper in rattled-out, German-accented Latin, Benedict said given his “advanced age”, “in full consciousness of the gravity of this step, in full liberty, I declare that I am renouncing the ministry of bishop of Rome, successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me.”

In a recent interview, Ms Chirri recalled feeling physically sick when she realised what was happening on hearing the words “ingravescente aetate” or “advanced age”, a phrase used by the Vatican in a regulation requiring bishops to retire at 75.

After hurriedly confirming with Vatican sources that she was not mistaken, she sent an alert on the ANSA newswire, announcing the pope would step down as of February 28th.

[ The Irish Times view on the death of Pope Benedict ]

It caused pandemonium in newsrooms internationally – including in the Reuters Rome office, where the ANSA feed ticked across a screen in the office live, 24 hours a day – as journalists scrambled to match the story.

At the time, the reaction was: a Pope can resign?

No Pope had done so for 600 years. The historical precedents available took place in vastly different, sometimes chaotic, and often factually unclear circumstances.

Benedict was seen as using his heft as a theologian, the authority he carried as a Catholic intellectual and former head of the Church’s doctrinal department, to adjust norms to fit a period in history in which humans live longer.

It was the first in a string of voluntary monarchical abdications that year – due to age, health, or the desire to give way to the next generation – including by the Dutch queen, the emir of Qatar, and the king of Belgium.

[ Michael McDowell: Major inquiry into secondary school sex abuse may be less useful than focused study ]

For an institution built on tradition and precedent, everything Benedict did next was a novelty, from picking the title “pope emeritus”, to his choice to wear a white cassock and live out his life in a monastery on Vatican grounds.

A discussion is now under way among canon lawyers on the development of formal guidelines to avoid any potential future rivalry between serving and former pontiffs, or confusion over whose authority presides.