Pope Benedict's Resignation, Why he resigned?

When a group is likened to “mafia-style organized crime rings”, you immediately assume the group in question is involved with organizing prostitution or drugs.

When you learn that the “mafia-style organized crime ring” refers to the Catholic Church, you are surprised, although admittedly, not as surprised as you think you should be.

The Catholic Church has been beleaguered with scandal in recent years, so much so that even the world’s faithful of this embattled institution have been shaken.

At the core of the scandal is the increasing number of cases which have surfaced claiming priests had sexually abused children and then veiled behind a wall of silence.

In the summer of 2011, the Catholic Church in Germany promised a full investigation into the sex abuse claims, an inquiry that was meant to restore faith in the tormented establishment. The Lower Saxony Criminology Research Institute (KFN) was given the responsibility of investigating the cases. However, shortly after, the Church called off the investigations, claiming there was a breakdown in trust.

“The relationship of mutual trust between bishops and the head of the institute has been destroyed,” said the Bishop of Trier, Stephan Ackermann. (1)

The Pope Announces His Resignation

The antagonism and deeper mistrust caused by what was arguably a half-hearted inquiry being called off by the Church paled into comparative insignificance when Pope Benedict XVI recently announced his resignation.

The Pope’s announcement that he would resign the papacy at the end of February 2013, which would see him be the first pope to resign since 1415, naturally shocked the Vatican and Catholic community around the world.

The shocking resignation evoked further controversy and generated a swathe of conspiracy theories that the 85-year-old’s decision to step down was influenced by the sex scandal.

While the child sex abuse allegations were obviously a huge weight on Pope Benedict’s shoulders, many commentators believe that the VatiLeaks butler scandal and allegations of impropriety at the Vatican Bank played a greater role in the Pope’s resignation.

In 2012, Paolo Gabriele, the former butler of Pope Benedict, admitted to leaking hundreds of private documents to an Italian journalist. The papers found their way to His Holiness, a book written by Gianluigi Nuzzi, the Italian journalist, which portrays the Holy See as a lair of financial dishonesty.

Why Did He Resign?

Referring to the resignation as a “personal decision” in his address, the Pope gave relatively straightforward, yet a little vague, reasons. His “advanced age” and that his own mind and body had “deteriorated in me to the extent that I have to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me” were Pope Benedict’s reasons for stepping down. (2)

While old age and ill-health are the most common and natural reasons one resigns from a job, journalists and conspiracy theorists around the world have crafted their own versions to why Pope Benedict XVI abruptly ended his papacy.

While claims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church are not entirely new and have brought shame to institution for the past 20 years, Benedict’s eight year reign as the head of the Catholic Church has been particularly turbulent.

Under Pope Benedict’s watch, the Church has been beset with revelations of child sex abuse as well as question marks emerging over the Vatican Bank’s proficiency in dealing with money laundering controversies.

Failing to be reactionary in order to help the victims of the so-called “epidemic of sex and child abuse scandals that erupted under Benedict’s papacy”, has been at the heart of the criticism aimed at the current Pope.

Many of the victims of the scandal have reacted bitterly to the Pope’s resignation, such as 64-year-old Norbert Deneft of the NetworkB group of German abuse victims. In 2003, Denef reported being abused by a priest for six years when he was a boy to the bishop of Magdeburg. Denef was offered 24,000 euros in return for a pledge of silence about the abuse he endured as a child.

Referring to the Vatican’s treatment of the sex abuse charges as being “mafia-style organised crime rings,” Denef told the Guardian:

“We won’t miss this pope.” (2)

As Vatican expert John Allen said:

“Benedict may not have quit because of the paedophilia scandals or any other specific controversy, but it’s hard to believe they didn’t play a role.” (3)