Vatican Investigation Underway to Determine Whether or not Benedict XVI Truly Resigned
It has surfaced in the news that a Vatican investigation is presently underway to officially determine the validity of Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation in 2013. This has been confirmed by the Vatican’s Office of the Promoter of Justice, which is responsible for conducting criminal investigations for the tribunal of the Vatican City State.
Professor Allesandro Diddi who heads the office, is spearheading this move in the wake of widespread allegations that Benedict XVI never renounced his papal office or munus. And of course, if he didn’t renounce his office it would mean that Francis was never a pope.
Benedict indeed stepped down from the Chair of Peter but there is no logical reason to think that he was no longer a pope. His stepping down can be compared to one who gives up driving his car while continuing to possess a valid driver license. Benedict gave up the active ministry of driving the Barque of Peter while continuing to retain his papal license (office).
In a 2016 book-length interview with Pope Benedict’s biographer Peter Seewald, Benedict told the journalist: "The situation of Celestine V was extremely peculiar and could in no way be invoked as my precedent."
Pope Celestine V resigned, but in doing so he completely abdicated the Petrine office. That is, he laid off his munus and went back to being the simple monk Pietro da Morrone, and not Pope Emeritus. On the contrary, Benedict said he “in no way” related to what Celestine did, that full abdication from the papacy is what he did not do.
What Benedict did do was to simply step down from the active exercise of the papacy while retaining his office. Consider his own words delivered on the eve of his resignation.
“Anyone who accepts the Petrine ministry no longer has any privacy. He belongs always and completely to everyone, to the whole Church... The ‘always’ is also a ‘forever’--there can no longer be a return to the private sphere. My decision to resign the active exercise of the ministry does not revoke this.” (Pope Benedict XVI, General Audience, February 27, 2013)
According to the text, Benedict’s office was never revoked. Church law states that a pope must fully give up his office in order for his resignation to be valid. (Canon 332) Benedict makes it clear that he chose to retain his office "forever," which is why he continued to wear the papal garb and to go by the name Benedict XVI.
This matches the explanation offered by Benedict’s private secretary Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who also served as Prefect of the Pontifical Household until February 2023.
"He left the Papal Throne,” Gänswein said, “and yet, with the step he took on 11 February 2013, he has not abandoned this ministry," adding that the renunciation of his office would have been "quite impossible after his irrevocable acceptance of the office in April 2005."
Gänswein here says that Benedict was still the pope. “This is the reason why the correct appellation for him is ‘Your Holiness,’” he said.
What it boils down to is that the Vatican deep state forced Benedict to step down because they detested his teachings and his strong support of the Traditional Latin Mass. According to Seewald, the pressures they placed on him were so great that it was ruining his health.
We know from the late Cardinal Danneels of Brussels that he was part of a radical "mafia" reformist group opposed to Benedict XVI. Danneels, known for his support of abortion, LGBTQ, and gay-marriage, said in a taped interview in September 2015 that he and several cardinals were part of this "mafia" clique that was calling for drastic changes in the Church, to make it "much more modern," and that the plan was to oust Benedict and have Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio head it.
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