Pope Benedict XVI stunned the world when he announced his resignation in 2013, the first in 600 years. That led some to wonder if, as he grew increasingly frail and sick, Pope Francis would follow that precedent.
While Francis kept open the possibility, and even had a resignation letter prepared, he said more recently that he believed that the papacy was for life. And he ultimately lived out that belief, serving in his ministry until his death on Monday, at the age of 88.
Benedict, even before his resignation, he had argued that a pontiff should step aside if he got too old or infirm to do the role. It was nonetheless a shock when he announced in Latin that his “strength of mind and body” had diminished and that he couldn’t carry on.
His dramatic exit paved the way for Francis’ election and created the unprecedented arrangement of two popes living side-by-side, with Benedict in a converted monastery in the Vatican gardens until his death on Dec. 31, 2022.
In his 2024 memoir, “Life: My Story Through History,” Francis recounted how, when he was still the archbishop of Buenos Aires, he thought he had misunderstood the news when he first learned about Benedict’s resignation.
“For a moment I was paralyzed. I could hardly believe what I was hearing,” Francis wrote. “This was news I had never expected to receive in my lifetime: the resignation of a pope was unimaginable, although it was provided for in canon law."
But he said he realized that Benedict would have meditated and prayed for a long time before coming to that “brave and historic decision.”
During the decade they lived together in the Vatican as a reigning and “emeritus pope,” Francis repeatedly praised Benedict’s courage and humility for resigning and said that he had “opened the door” to future popes also stepping down.
But after Benedict died, Francis' changed course. While confirming he had a resignation letter prepared in case he became medically incapacitated, he pointed to the risks that papal resignations might become a “fashion” or the norm.
“Benedict had the courage to do it because he didn’t feel like going on because of his health. I, for the moment, do not have that on my agenda,” he said, according to closed-door comments with the Jesuit community in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in February 2023, which were reported by the Jesuit journal La Civilta Cattolica.
"I believe that the pope’s ministry is ad vitam (for life). I see no reason why it shouldn’t be so. The ministry of the great patriarchs is always for life. And historical tradition is important.”
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Gera contributed from Warsaw, Poland.
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