Should the Pope resign?

VATICAN CITY: A remark by the Vatican’s number two official about the possibility of a papal resignation has touched a raw nerve, setting off an emotional debate among some of Pope John Paul II’s closest advisers. With the Pope in the hospital after severe breathing difficulties brought on by the flu, the issue has become the talk of the Vatican despite efforts by his inner circle to dampen any speculation.

No pope has resigned for centuries, and the frail 84-year-old pontiff repeatedly has said he intends to stay on — even asserting that he continues to serve the church from his hospital room. His forehead smeared with the traditional mark of mortality, John Paul celebrated Ash Wednesday in his room, missing public prayers opening the Lenten season of fasting and reflection for the first time in 26 years. He received ashes he had blessed earlier during Wednesday’s ceremony at the hospital, where he was rushed on February 1 with throat spasms. The pope invited his personal doctor, Renato Buzzonetti, and others to join him, papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said.

Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the Pope’s vicar for Rome, said the Pope looked “really well” more than a week after his urgent hospitalisation. Talk that John Paul might eventually step down has been in the air for almost a decade, as the pope has visibly weakened from Parkinson’s disease and hip and knee ailments. His speech has been slurred for some years and because of difficulties to even stand, he now uses a wheeled throne pushed by aides. John Paul, however, has consistently brushed aside any speculation, often declaring he would carry out his mission until the end. So Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Holy See’s number two official, surprised observers when he responded to a reporter asking whether the ailing Pope would ever consider stepping down?

“Let’s leave that hypothesis up to the Pope’s conscience,” Sodano responded Monday. “We must have great faith in the Pope. He knows what to do,” he said. Since then, several other cardinals have made similar comments, including Argentine Jorge Mejia, a former classmate in Rome of John Paul, and the Paris archbishop, Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger. Mejia said the Pope “must decide when his physical conditions will be so serious that he won’t be able to go on anymore.” “He can resign, and it’s a question of his conscience,” Lustiger told a French radio station Wednesday. “The Pope must do what he thinks to be the will of God to accomplish his mission.” On the other hand, Lustiger said, the Pope’s forbearance in the face of his ailments was an important symbol for Roman Catholics. “The Pope doesn’t have to be like (Arnold) Schwarzenegger, the governor of California, to give the example of the superman who runs the church,” the French prelate said.

Still, any such talk has angered some. “It is bad taste to talk about it, and it’s even worse because the starting point of this debate is the Pope’s flu,” said Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, head of the Congregation of Bishops. Another key Vatican cardinal, Dario Castrillon Hoyos of the Congregation for the Clergy, said a resignation “is not the order of the day because he has the helm of the Church firmly in his hands.” The American Jesuit and Vatican expert the Rev Thomas Reese said as many as ten popes are estimated to have resigned, but the historical evidence is not clear. The most famous is Pope Celestine V, who assumed the papacy in 1294 at the age of 85 and resigned five months later, saying he was not up to the task.

He was later put under guard for fear he would become the rallying point for a schism. In the Divine Comedy, Dante consigned him to the vestibule of hell, apparently for his “cowardice” in making “the grand refusal.” The Church’s Code of Canon Law has provisions for a resignation, but Reese and experts at the Vatican say the wording poses potential problems. The resignation must be “freely made and properly manifested,” according to the church law, but it is not clear what would be done if the Pope becomes incapacitated. The Vatican has declined to comment officially on whether John Paul has left written instructions. Other recent popes are said to have done so.