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Pope Benedict XVI's resignation: Live Report By Katherine Haddon (AFP) – 8 minutes ago LONDON — 1155 GMT:
The Pope recently started using Twitter, tweeting as @Pontifex and gathering over a million and a half followers.
His most recent tweet on Sunday said: "We must trust in the mighty power of God?s mercy. We are all sinners, but His grace transforms us and makes us new." 1152 GMT: Benedict XVI's comments have repeatedly attracted controversy during his time in the Vatican.
He stirred fury in the Muslim world in 2006 with a speech which appeared to endorse the view of a 14th cenutry Byzantine emperor that Islam is inherently evil. In 2009, he struggled to mollify Jews after inviting a breakaway, ultra-conservative faction back into the Church by lifting the excommunication of four bishops
. One of these insists no-one died in the gas chambers of Nazi Germany.
How will the Pope be remembered after nearly eight years in the role? He took over as successor to the highly popular John Paul II in 2005 at the age of 78. A brilliant scholar, he was a strong defender of Roman Catholic orthodoxy and had earned the nickname "God's Rottweiler." He opposed abortion, gay marriage and euthanasia and stressed family values. 1137 GMT: French President Francois Hollande has described the Pope's decision to resign as "eminently respectable".
Meanwhile, a government spokesman in the Pope's home nation of Germany has expressed "respect" and "gratitude" for the Pope in response. "The federal government has the greatest possible respect for the Holy Father, for his accomplishments, for his life-long work for the Catholic Church,"
The Pope has explained his decision to a meeting of cardinals, saying his strength has "deteriorated" in the last few months. "After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry," he told the meeting. "In order to govern the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognise my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me."
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