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Andreas Gebert / dpa via AP
A priest stands in front of the birthplace of Pope Benedict XVI in the German village of Marktl on Monday, after Benedict announced he would resign because he no longer felt up to the rigors of the job.
MARKTL, Germany -- "We are Pope!" declared the German daily 'Bild' proudly and boldly on its front page after Pope Benedict XVI was elected in 2005. Now, the dream of a German pope is over. Soon it could be "We were Pope!"
The sudden news of the Pope's resignation shocked his native Germany. Radio stations reported that some at first thought the announcement was a bad carnival joke.
"I was shocked, because it came as a real surprise for, I think, everyone, as there were no signs of a resignation," said Josef Kaiser, a local Catholic priest in the Pope's birthplace, Marktl. Benedict was born Joseph Ratzinger in this Bavarian hamlet in 1927.
After his election, thousands descended on the village in southeastern Germany and his family's former home was turned into a museum. In the ensuing years, 200,000 visitors came to Marktl. On Monday, the evening of his resignation announcement, crowds of mostly journalists and photographers surrounded the pope's birthplace -- the bright lights of television crews lighting up the building possibly for the last time.
Mentioning no specific ailment other than 'advanced age,' Pope Benedict's parting came as a shocking announcement for many – except for the Pope's brother, who said he knew Benedict had been thinking about stepping down for months. NBC's Richard Engel reports.
"Marktl changed, because this was a very sleepy, small village of about two and a half thousand inhabitants and suddenly through the pope's election, it became the center of media attention," Kaiser said.
"It's quite sad that he already resigned," said Marktl's mayor, Hubert Gschwendtner.
"At first I didn't believe it," Gschwendtner added. "Last June I met him in Rome and he seemed quite well mentally and physically."
But the Pope's brother, the Rev. Georg Ratzinger, said Benedict's resignation was not sudden for him. He knew it was a process that had started a while ago and worsened as he weakened.
"He didn't have the strength anymore that the office demands," Ratzinger said.
Javier Barbancho / AFP - Getty Images
Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI in 2005. Look back at his life from childhood through his papacy.
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Who's next? 8 cardinal contenders
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"We are Pope"! Is that like "We are Penn State"? Sounds like the same kind of coverups were going down...
Here's a thought. How about picking somebody born in the second half of the 20th century?
I think the reason the pope is stepping down is because somebody found out a dark secret from his past and was about to go public. When he was a young man, he had sex with a woman. Such a scandal!!!
That's a vicious dirty rumor Joe! The pope has never had any kind of sex except the holy priest/boy kind.
Pope's hometown is shocked he's leaving?? I thought this is what they were shocked about: "The number of Germans leaving the Roman Catholic Church rose dramatically in 2010 as Pope Benedict XVI's homeland wrestled with reports of systematic sexual abuse of minors and attempted cover-ups..."
Every Catholic that denies that there is problem is contributing to the next abuse case by not demanding that the Church get it together immediately. The Pope had that chance and he blew it. They don't know how to control the monster they've created.
I'm sure the folks in Ratzinger's home town also remember how he helped cover up the horrible crimes of Father Peter Hullerman, who raped many children in the area. Too bad Ratzinger never called the cops.....not even once.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/sex-abuse-scandal-did-archbishop-ratzinger-help-shield-perpetrator-from-prosecution-a-684970.html
Are there ANY photos of the pope where he is looking at the camera?
I'm in disbelief that so many Billions are so gullible. Goes to reason mankind doesn't have a prayer to survive eternity.
As a survivor of priest rape and torture I often have questions no parishioners can ever seem to want to answer. The biggest is how should I understand that you parishioners hold a proven gang of pedophile pimps and rapists among your midst in such high esteem and call them all holy, worthy of heaven and adoration? I mean to be truly repentant of your sins, you must do all you can to correct the harm done. To be truly forgiven of your sins, you must totally repent for them. The leaders of the RCC have only given show, not true repentance for the evil that was done to us as children.
I have been writing a book about what happened to me called Our Father Who Art in Hell. In it I describe what happened to me in great detail. I tell about the rape and what that priest did that night to take my heart, soul, mind and body. I am also having a second section to this book, it involves all of the research I have done since I found my courage and came out of the priest abuse closet, out of the darkness that had controlled my life for 38 years, through horrifying nightmares, drug and alcohol abuse, suicide attempts, prison stays, my utter and complete hatred for the God and Jesus Christ I once followed and for the church I once loved with all of my heart as a child growing up in the Roman Catholic Church.
Yes I was a troubled young teen and I had run away from an abusive foster home only to be put into St Thomas More parish, where for one night, a priest there who was supposed to keep me safe from all harm, to protect me, spent the night committing evil upon me no one should have had to endure. Just because I was a troubled young teen gave this perverted degenerate no right to perpetrate upon me the crimes he did that night. This crime still haunts me to this day, and those who did this evil should pay.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition states:
2356 Rape is the forcible violation of the sexual intimacy of another person. It does injury to justice and charity. Rape deeply wounds the respect, freedom, and physical and moral integrity to which every person has a right. It causes grave damage that can mark the victim for life. It is always an intrinsically evil act. Graver still is the rape of children committed by parents (incest) or those responsible for the education of the children entrusted to them.
This is a list I have compiled so far on Priests, Brothers, Bishops, Cardinals etc who are involved in the Priest Rape and Coverups of the Roman Catholic Church. It contains 200 names. From the church's own documents and court documents, for each person named, there is direct proof of their participation of the cover up of systematic rape of children or, in the case of the priests, have been either convicted, or accused with reliable evidence, of raping children. I have barely scratched the surface trust me.
1.Pope Benedict XVI
2.Cardinal Timothy Dolan
3.Cardinal Justin Rigali
4.Cardinal Bernard Law
5.Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua
6.Cardinal Richard Cushing
7.Cardinal Humberto Medeiros
8.Cardinal William J Leveda
9.Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick
10.Cardinal Roger Mahoney
11.Cardinal Angelo Sodano
12.Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone
13.Cardinal Hans Hermann Groër
14.Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor
15.Cardinal Sean Brady
16.Cardinal John Krol
17.Cardinal Desmond Connell
18.Cardinal John Joseph O'Connor
19.Cardinal George Pell
20.Archbishop Romulo G. Valles
21.Archbishop Orlando B. Quevedo
22.Archbishop Ernesto Antolin Salgado
23.Archbishop Juliusz Paetz
24.Archbishop William E Cousins
25.Archbishop Elden Francis Curtiss
26.Archbishop Philip Wilson
27.Bishop Michael Malone
28.Bishop Stanislaw Wielgus
29.Bishop Michael Patrick Driscoll
30.Bishop Tod Brown
31.Bishop William J Lynn
32.Bishop Kurt Krenn
33.Bishop Manuel Moreno
34.Bishop John B McCormack
35.Bishop Robert Finn
36.Bishop Leopoldo C. Jaucian
37.Bishop Martin Jumoad
38.Bishop Rodolfo F. Beltran
39.Bishop Juan de Dios Pueblos
40.Bishop Roger Vangheluwe
41.Bishop John Aloysius Ward
42.Bishop Brendan Comiskey
43.Bishop Donal J. Herlihy
44.Bishop John Magee
45.Bishop Séamus Hegarty
46.Bishop Donal Murray
47.Bishop Joseph R. Cistone
48.Bishop Georg Müller
49.Bishop Raymond Lahey
50.Bishop Alphonsus Liguori Penney
51.Bishop Joseph Anthony Ferrario
52.Bishop Lawrence Soens
53.Bishop Thomas J. O'Brien
54.Bishop Gerard Louis Frey
55.Bishop Raymond W. Lessard
56.Bishop Leo Clarke
57.Bishop Roger Mahoney
58.Coadjutor Bishop John J. Myers
59.Priest Michael Charles Glennon
60.Priest Michael Aulsebrook
61.Priest Frank Klep
62.Priest David Rapon
63.Priest Gerald Ridsdale
64.Priest Denis McAlinden
65.Priest Brian Lucas
66.Priest Wayland Brown
67.Priest Oliver O'Grady
68.Priest Arthur O'Brien
69.Priest Edward Avery
70.Priest John McDevitt
71.Priest Paul LeBrun
72.Priest Joseph Briceno
73.Priest Mark Lehman
74.Priest Stephen Kiesle
75.Priest Joseph Bukoski
76.Priest Franc Frantar
77.Priest Thomas Adamson
78.Priest James Hickey
79.Priest Patrick Hughes
80.Priest Denis Daly
81.Priest Eugene Greene
82.Priest Seán Fortune
83.Priest Federico Lombardi
84.Priest Paul McGennis
85.Priest Gilbert Gauthe
86.Priest John Kinsey
87.Priest William Manahan
88.Priest Paul Couch
89.Priest Bernard Green
90.Priest Piers Grant-Ferris
91.Priest John Kinsey
92.Priest Richard White
93.Priest Jeremiah McGrath
94.Priest James Carragher
95.Priest James Robinson
96.Priest Micheál Ledwith
97.Priest Alexander Bede Walsh
98.Priest André Vanderlyn
99.Priest Robert Borremans
100.Priest Joris Horvath
101.Priest Bruno Vos
102.Priest Jef Van den Ouweland
103.Priest Marc Vangheluwe
104.Priest Bart Aben
105.Priest Louis Dupont
106.Priest André Louis
107.Priest Gilbert Hubermont
108.Priest Jean-François Gysels
109.Priest Ivan ÄuÄek
110.Priest Drago LjubiÄiÄ
111.Priest František Merta
112.Priest François Lefort
113.Priest Pierre Dufour
114.Priest Henri Lebras
115.Priest Denis Vadeboncoeur
116.Priest Bruno Kieffer
117.Priest Jean Luc Heckner
118.Priest Father Peter Hullermann
119.Priest Fraul Cabonce
120.Priest Christopher Basil "Kit" Cunningham
121.Priest Brenden Smyth
122.Priest Samuel Martinez
123.Priest Stanley Gana
124.Priest Francis Lundy
125.Priest Ciro Benedettini
126.Priest Fredrico Lombardi
127.Priest George Bredemann
128.Priest Michael Hill
129.Priest William Manahan
130.Priest John Lloyd
131.Priest Joseph Jordan
132.Priest Thomas Smolich
133.Priest Charles Leonard Connor
134.Priest Jerold Linder
135.Priest Santiago
136.Priest Shawn Ratigan
137.Priest Paul R Shanley
138.Priest Joseph E. Birmingham
139.Priest Ronald Paquin
140.Priest John Hanlon
141.Priest Paul Mahan
142.Priest Ernest Tourigney
143.Priest Richard Matte
144.Priest James Doyle
145.Priest James Grennan
146.Priest Seán Fortune
147.Priest Daniel McCormack
148.Priest William Goltz
149.Priest Juan Carlos Duran
150.Priest James Porter
151.Priest Edward Paquette
152.Priest William Roach
153.Priest Neil Doherty
154.Priest Anthony Mercieca
155.Priest Lawrence C Murphy
156.Priest Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul
157.Priest Eleuterio Ramos
158.Priest Albert Davis
159.Priest Siegfried Widera
160.Priest Charles Barnett
161.Priest Vincent Ryan
162.Priest David O'Hearn
163.Priest John Sidney Denham
164.Priest James Fletcher
165.Priest Charles Engelhardt
166.Priest Kelvin Gerald Sharkey
167.Priest Adrian Richard Van Klooster
168.Priest Roger Michael Bellemore
169.Priest Julio Grassi
170.Priest Tarcísio Tadeu Spricigo
171.Priest Marcial Maciel
172.Priest Geraldo da Consolação Machado
173.Priest Felix Barbosa Carreiro
174.Priest José Andrés Aguirre Ovalle
175.Priest Gilbert Gauthe
176.Priest Neville Joseph Creen
177.Priest Peter Lewis Comensoli
178.Diocesan Director of Youth Vincent Kieran Kiss
179.Reverend James "Ron" Gonsalves
180.Marist Brother Ross Murrin
181.Brother Michael Evans
182.Brother Gerard William Dick
183.Brother John William Chute
184.Brother David Christian
185.Brother Robert Charles Best
186.Brother Gregory Ferguson
187.Brother William Stanley Irwin
188.Brother Kevin Francis Phillips
189.Brother Brian Joseph Spillane
190.Msgr. David Cappo
191.Msgr. William Roach
192.Msgr. Dale Fushek
193.Msgr. Michael A. Harris
194.Msgr. Micheál Ledwidth
195.Msgr. Georg Ratzinger
196.Msgr. James Malloy
197.Canon Martin Clancy
198.Padre Wolfgang S
199.Teacher Bernard Shero
200.Layman Daniel Bernardo Beltrán Murguía Ward