Pope stepping down

Roman Catholic leader cites age as reason for resignation.
Just a couple months after turning to Twitter, Pope Benedict XVI says he will resign February 28th – the first pontiff to do so in nearly 600 years.

The 85-year-old pope announced his decision in Latin during a meeting of Vatican cardinals this morning.

He emphasized carrying out his duties as leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics requires “both strength of mind and body.”

Benedict told the cardinals that due to his advanced age his strengths are no longer suited to “an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry.”

He called his choice “a decision of great importance for the life of the church.”

The pope’s brother, Georg Ratzinger, says the pontiff had been advised by his doctor not to take any more transatlantic trips and had been considering stepping down for months.

The 89-year-old Ratzinger said his 85-year-old brother was having increasing difficulty walking and that his resignation was part of a “natural process.”

In the words of the pope’s brother, “His age is weighing on him.

At this age my brother wants more rest.”

The move sets the stage for the Vatican to hold a conclave to elect a new pope by mid-March, since the traditional mourning time that would follow the death of a pope doesn’t have to be observed.

There are several papal contenders in the wings, but no obvious front-runner; the same situation when Benedict was elected pontiff in 2005 after the death of Pope John Paul II.

The last pope to resign was Pope Gregory XII, who stepped down in 1415 in a deal to end the Great Western Schism among competing papal claimants.