{"id":974,"date":"2013-02-12T08:38:10","date_gmt":"2013-02-12T13:38:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=974"},"modified":"2013-02-12T08:39:46","modified_gmt":"2013-02-12T13:39:46","slug":"on-the-popes-resignation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/on-the-popes-resignation\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Pope’s Resignation"},"content":{"rendered":"

The headlines were glaring, “The Pope is Resigning.”\u00a0 I have to admit that when I say the headline yesterday morning I was shocked.\u00a0 I thought ‘what’s wrong?’\u00a0 It turns out that nothing is wrong.\u00a0 Pope Benedict XVI is 85 years old.\u00a0 His health is declining and has decided in the best interest of the Church to resign.\u00a0 You can read the story of his resignation at http:\/\/www.catholicnews.com\/data\/stories\/cns\/1300560.htm<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I agree with the statement of our Apostolic Administrator, Bishop Cunningham<\/a>, who described Pope Benedict’s resignation as one of courage<\/em>.\u00a0 This could not have been an easy decision for Pope Benedict.\u00a0 It has been 600 years since a pope has resigned.\u00a0 Pope Benedict has served the Church faithfully for many years, most recently as pope, but also as cardinal, bishop, priest, and teacher.\u00a0 May he know the peace of Christ always and find rest in “retirement.”<\/p>\n

Of course, this leaves us all wondering about the future.\u00a0 What happens now?\u00a0 For stories about the election of a new pope check out http:\/\/www.catholicnews.com\/data\/stories\/cns\/1300575.htm<\/a>.\u00a0 It is natural curiosity to wonder what happens now.\u00a0 It was just 8 years ago when Pope John Paul II died but people might ask will the process be different now since Pope Benedict is still alive?\u00a0 The answer is generally no.\u00a0 I say generally because with the death of a pope, there is the funeral and period of mourning that will not happen in this case.<\/p>\n

What does amaze me but not surprise me, giving human nature, is that people immediately began speculating on who the next pope will be.\u00a0 Again, part of this is natural curiosity.\u00a0 Part of it is legitimate concern for the future.\u00a0 Unfortunately, part of it is not much better than gossip.<\/p>\n

Who do I think will be the new pope?\u00a0 Well, it will probably <\/em>be a cardinal.\u00a0 Beyond that, I don’t know and it is not for me to decide.\u00a0 What is for and for all of us is to pray that the person God is calling to be the next pope be the one elected.\u00a0 It doesn’t matter what I want<\/em> the new pope to say or do.\u00a0 It doesn’t matter what you want the new pope to say or do.\u00a0 God is the one who knows best.\u00a0 God is the one who should be in control (and is).\u00a0 Remember the words from the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy Will Be<\/strong> Done<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Let us pray for Pope Benedict XVI as he steps aside and for the selection of the new pope be under the guidance of the Holy Spirit so that the person elected be the one God is calling.<\/p>\n

Peace,<\/p>\n

Fr. Jeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The headlines were glaring, “The Pope is Resigning.”\u00a0 I have to admit that when I say the headline yesterday morning I was shocked.\u00a0 I thought ‘what’s wrong?’\u00a0 It turns out that nothing is wrong.\u00a0 Pope Benedict XVI is 85 years old.\u00a0 His health is declining and has decided in the best interest of the Church …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘On the Pope’s Resignation’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-fI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=974"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":976,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974\/revisions\/976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}