Showing posts with label Pope Benedict. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pope Benedict. Show all posts

Thursday, January 5, 2023

Pope Benedict's Funeral

     Pope Benedict is being buried today in Vatican. He passed on last Saturday, on New Year's Eve. He was probably the shortest term of a Pope, the first Pope to ever resign from his post then Pope Francis came into power. He was Pope from from 2005 until 2013.
Solemn funeral service for the ex-Pope

     The ceremony at St. Peter's Square seems solemn, especially among Catholics all over the world as he was their leader when he was still the Pope. 

     I remember my grandmother's story of how a Pope is chosen. When I was young, I have always thought popes are divinely chosen as was inculcated by my ultra-religious grandmother who was born in 1887, when the Philippines was still a colony of Spain and was responsible for her Catholic mindset.

     My grandmother told me that to chose a Pope, all Cardinals meet in Vatican, for now what I know as the conclave. They will be locked in a secluded room, according to her, holding a candle in their hands, for days in silence and prayers. Whoever holds the candle that gets lighted is the one chosen by God to be the new Pope. What a story concocted by my grandmother, I don't know if she actually believed in it or she related it to me with the hope of strengthening my faith. Only when I grew up I got to learn they vote during the conclave to elect a new Pope.