Without a pastoral cross and with black shoes: Benedict XVI’s clothing indicates that he did not reign

With the opening this Monday of the burning chapel of Benedict XVIwho died on Saturday at the age of 95, hundreds of faithful will be able to watch over the body of the pope emeritus for three days in the Basilica of San Pedro, whose garments indicate that he did not reign.

The Catholic Churchwhich he usually communicates through his sacred symbols, thus announces that the reigning pontiff has not died.

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Thus the remains of Benedict XVI do not carry the so-called “pastoral cross”, the characteristic cane of the popes, also called the fisherman’s cross.

According to religious sources, to determine the garments with which the first potato emeritus of history, that is to say without functions, it was necessary to establish new norms.

AFP.

Thus he does not wear the papal pallium, a circular ribbon with crosses that popes carry on their shoulders.

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That pallium indicates the jurisdiction of the metropolitan archbishops and was granted to him three times: in 1977 with his appointment as Archbishop of Munich and Freising in Germany, in 2002 when he became dean of the College of Cardinals and in 2005 when he was elected pope, he underlined the Vaticanist Francesco Grana.

the body of Joseph Ratzingerwhich was specially treated to be exhibited in San Pedro, He was dressed in the white cassock that he wore from his election to the throne of Peter on April 19, 2005, until his death on December 31, 2022.

This photo taken on January 2, 2023 by Vatican media shows people waiting in line to pay their respects before the body of emeritus Pope Benedict XVI in St. Peter’s Basilica. (AFP).

A decision that generated theological debates even in life, since some scholars and experts considered that it was not correct for him to wear the papal white cassock and reside within the Vatican after his resignation.

He is also dressed in a red chasuble and a white miter trimmed in gold, both of which are emblems of papal mourning.

Intertwined in the hands you can see the rosary beadsbut what is most surprising are the black shoesgiven that the red shoes, worn by John Paul II, Paul VI and John Paul I, evoke the blood shed by the martyrs following in the footsteps of Christ.

A usage that the reigning Pope Francisco broke, since he prefers to wear red only inside and opted for the black shoes that he has always worn and with which he arrived at the Vatican.

According to the Vaticanists, Ratzinger He will be buried with the episcopal ring and not with the fisherman’s ring, which he wore during his eight-year pontificate (2005-2013), and which was destroyed just after his resignation on February 28, 2013.

Source: Elcomercio