ROME
Chiesa
by Sandro Magister
ROME, February 14, 2013 – On the evening of an unremarkable Thursday in Lent, at 8 p.m. on February 28, Joseph Ratzinger will take the step that none of his predecessors had dared to take. He will place upon the throne of Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Which another will be called to take up.
There is the power of a revolution in this action that has no equal even in centuries long ago. From that point on, the Church enters into unknown territory. It will have to elect a new pope while his predecessor is still alive, his words still resounding, his orders still binding, his agenda still waiting to be implemented.
Those cardinals who on the morning of Monday, February 11 were convoked in the hall of the consistory for the canonization of the eight hundred Christians of Otranto martyred by the Turks six centuries ago were stunned at hearing Benedict XVI, at the end of the ceremony, announce in Latin his resignation of the pontificate.
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