In answer to the question, “What do you think of the Holy Father resigning?”
Shocked to say the least, but not surprised.
The bear on Benedict’s seal comes from the legendary story of a Frankish saint by the name of St. Corbinian who was once on his way to Rome. Along the way, a bear attacked the priest and his packhorse, killing his horse. Rather than flee in terror, the saint rebuked the bear and made the animal carry his luggage the rest of the way to the Vatican. Once he arrived, he released it from his service, and it returned to Bavaria in Germany.
Benedict, when telling this story, compared himself not to the saint but to the bear, sometimes lamenting his predecessor calling him to Rome, but unlike the bear not allowing him his freedom. As Cardinal Ratzinger, prefect for the congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he tried to resign a few times and return to Germany to teach theology, but his pope wouldn’t allow it.
St. Corbinian’s bear, as God’s beast of burden, most definitely symbolized the weight of the Petrine office in which Benedict carried over the past eight years. Now the weight of his office as Bishop of Rome and Chief Shepherd of Christ’s flock on earth has become all too much for the aging pope that he has finally decided to give the bear back his freedom.
His recent resignation makes him one of the few popes in history to abdicate his throne and the first in 600 years to do so. Now the reason why I say his recent resignation shocked me but did not surprise me is that Benedict has for the past few years through word and deed indicated that his resignation was a possibility. On two occasions: April 29 in 2009 and July 4 in 2010, Benedict visited the tomb of Pope St. Celestine V, leaving there his own pallium, a symbol of his authority as Christ’s vicar and the plentitude of his pontifical office, and began wearing a new pallium designed after Pope Celestine V’s. One can now see the relation of this event and Benedict’s recent resignation.
Celestine was a holy monk back in the 13th century, taking St. John the Baptist as his model. He wore a hair shirt and a chain of iron as penitential instruments. He fasted every day except Sunday and each year he kept four Lents on bread and water alone. He was elected pope in 1294, in a time of great corruption and contention in the church not unlike today.
Celestine was elected pope at 80 years of age; Benedict was 78 when he was elected pope in 2005. In Celestine, the church had a holy leader and many devout Catholics at that time thought the church would be reformed by this good man. This quiet and learned monk pleaded with the cardinals not to choose him. But having been chosen, he accepted the office only to give it up after five months by resigning, having found the burden of the office too heavy, struggling in vain to guide a seemingly ungovernable bark of Peter back then. He thought he would end his life in peace, but his successor Boniface VIII, fearing his opponents might use Celestine as a rallying point, ordered him confined in prison.
Thus, Benedict was showing us for some time that he was thinking of following in the footsteps of the saintly Pope St. Celestine by resigning. In his book, “The Light of the World,” Benedict said, “If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right, and under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign.” And so with shock but without great surprise, Benedict like Celestine, who also didn’t want the Petrine Office and like him has struggled to guide a seemingly ungovernable bark of Peter that seems about to sink, has now followed the footsteps of his saintly predecessor and resigned in all humility.
Unlike his predecessor Pope St. Celestine V, may this bear from Germany, also a holy and learned man, be given his freedom to devoutly serve the Holy Church of God in the future through a life dedicated to prayer, calling on God to save and sanctify the church through his successor. May God continue to bless and reward this Servant of the Servants of God (Servus servorum Dei).
Father Ronan Murphy is a priest of the Diocese of Camden.
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