Benedict XVI dies at 95

RELIGIONS NEWS AGENCY (REDNA) – Benedict XVI, reluctant pope who chose to retire, dies at 95.

“Vatican” reported Benedict died Saturday at his home in Vatican after suffering some illnesses.

Pope Francis himself will celebrate Benedict’s funeral Mass on Thursday, closing out an unprecedented chapter in the history of the papacy with a reigning pope eulogizing a retired one.

The intellectual German theologian, whose mission was to reawaken Christianity in a secularized and indifferent Europe, was forced to shoulder the brunt of the sex abuse scandal that festered unattended under St. John Paul II.

Then, as he planned to make a quiet exit from the papacy, another scandal erupted when his own butler stole his personal papers and gave them to a journalist — leading to revelations that laid bare the need for a reformer pope to clean up the Vatican’s act.

Tributes are being paid to Pope Benedict XVI and religious and political leaders speak of him as a great theologian and a great figure of history.