Benedict death paves way for protocols to guide future popes


              FILE - A helicopter with Pope Benedict XVI onboard leaves the Vatican, on Feb. 28, 2013. Pope Benedict XVI's 2013 resignation sparked calls for rules and regulations for future retired popes to avoid the kind of confusion that ensued. Benedict, the German theologian who will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign, has died, the Vatican announced Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. He was 95. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn, File)
            
              FILE - Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, third from left, meets with the winners of the 2022 Ratzinger Prize, Joseph Halevi Horowitz Weiler, left, and father Michel Fedou, partially hidden at right, at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery inside the Vatican where Benedict XVI lives, in this photo taken Thursday, Dec. 1, 2022. Pope Benedict XVI's 2013 resignation sparked calls for rules and regulations for future retired popes to avoid the kind of confusion that ensued. Benedict, the German theologian who will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign, has died, the Vatican announced Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. He was 95. Second from left, is the foundation's president Father Federico Lombardi, and fourth from left is Benedict XVI's long-time personal secretary Bishop Georg Gaenswein. (Fondazione Vaticana J.Ratzinger via AP, File)
            
              FILE - Pope Francis prays in front of the tomb of Pope Celestine V, who resigned on Dec. 13, 1294, in the St. Mary in Collemaggio Basilica in L'Aquila, central Italy, Sunday, Aug. 28, 2022. Pope Benedict XVI's 2013 resignation sparked calls for rules and regulations for future retired popes to avoid the kind of confusion that ensued. Benedict, the German theologian who will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign, has died, the Vatican announced Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. He was 95. (AP Photo/Domenico Stinellis, File)
            
              FILE - Mourners fill up St. Peter's Square, at The Vatican, early Wednesday, April 6, 2005, as they wait to enter St. Peter's Basilica to say a personal farewell to Pope John Paul II. The death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI passed in an entirely un-papal-like manner Saturday, Dec. 31, 2022, making clear once and for all that Benedict stopped being pope a decade ago, and that the rituals surrounding his death are more akin to those of a retired bishop than a pontiff, monarch or Vicar of Christ on Earth. (AP Photo/Diether Endlicher, File)
            
              FILE - Pope Francis embraces Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, right, at the Vatican, on June 28, 2017. Pope Benedict XVI's 2013 resignation sparked calls for rules and regulations for future retired popes to avoid the kind of confusion that ensued. Benedict, the German theologian who will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign, has died, the Vatican announced Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. He was 95. (L'Osservatore Romano/Pool Photo via AP, File)
            
              FILE - Pope Francis, second from left, watches Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI enter St. Peter's Basilica accompanied by Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, right, at the Vatican, on Dec. 8, 2015. Pope Benedict XVI's 2013 resignation sparked calls for rules and regulations for future retired popes to avoid the kind of confusion that ensued. Benedict, the German theologian who will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign, has died, the Vatican announced Saturday Dec. 31, 2022. He was 95. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)
Benedict death paves way for protocols to guide future popes