The Vatican says the death of the 95-year-old Benedict XVI is “very sick” but he is “lucid and vigilant”

Pope Francis has said that his predecessor Pope Benedict, the 95-year-old former pontiff who resigned from the post nine years ago, is “very sick” after a deterioration in his health on Wednesday.

“The situation at the moment remains under control and continually monitored by his doctors,” the spokesman, Matteo Bruni, said, adding that Francis visited his predecessor at the Mater Ecclesiae monastery in Vatican City after his general audience.

The Vatican said that Benedict died on Saturday, the first pontiff in 600 years to step down rather than hold office for life.

Gerard O’Connell, Vatican correspondent for the Jesuit magazine America, said it was after a fall during his visit to Mexico in 2012 that Benedict understood he could no longer fulfill his papal duties.

The German Catholic Church faulted Benedict’s handling of sex abuse cases four decades earlier. Abuses and errors took place while he was the pope’s archbishop. He denied the allegations.

The report found that he had been informed of four cases of sexual abuse involving minors – including two during his time in Munich – but failed to act, and that he had attended a meeting about an abusive priest.

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is “lucid and vigilant” but his condition remains serious, the Vatican said Thursday in an update on the former pontiff’s health.

Joseph Ratzinger, the Pope Emeritus, and the Pope’s Visit to the Holy See: Her Holiness Revisited

Ratzinger was a theologian who trained by April 16, 1927. Pope John Paul II’s death led to the election of Monsignor Joseph Ratzinger, who served the Vatican for 25 years as it’s top authority on orthodoxy. He was the first German pope since the 11th century.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) said many people would have “mixed feelings” about the life of Benedict. “Sadly, many clergy abuse victims are not out of the woods in terms of healing from their wounds and getting the justice they deserve,” SNAP wrote.

Benedict XVI was a giant of faith and reason. She said that he would speak to the hearts and minds of men with the spiritual, cultural andintellectual depth of his Magisterium.

Maltese Prime Minister Robert Abela also sent his condolences to the Holy See on behalf of Malta’s government in a tweet, adding, “The people of Malta recall the visit of His Holiness, where he conveyed a message of unity.”

“With sorrow I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9:34 in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican,” the Director of the Press Office of the Holy See, Matteo Bruni said.

The outgoing pope promised to stay hidden but continued to speak out on religious matters even after his retirement contributing to tensions within the Catholic Church.

Four years later, Pope John Paul II summoned him to Rome to head the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith — the Vatican’s theological watchdog, once known as the Roman Inquisition. He held the post for 24 years. During that time, one of his most controversial documents was “Dominus Jesus,” which emphasized the primacy of the Catholic Church and branded non-Christian religions as “gravely deficient” — potentially undermining Vatican II achievements toward dialogue between Catholicism and other denominations and religions.

Ratzinger became known as “Cardinal No” stemming from his efforts to crack down on the liberation theology movement, religious pluralism, challenges to traditional teachings on issues such as homosexuality, and calls to ordain women as priests.

He was known to be more conservative than his successor, Pope Francis, who has made moves to soften the Vatican’s position on abortion and homosexuality, as well as doing more to deal with the sexual abuse crisis that has engulfed the church in recent years and clouded Benedict’s legacy.

In an April public letter, Benedict claimed the sex abuse crisis was caused by the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s and the liberalism of the church’s moral teachings.

Benedict said in an authorized biography published in May that he was not interfering with the papacy behind the scenes. He was quoted as saying he had fallen victim to a “malignant distortion of reality.”

On Feb. 11, 2013, Benedict XVI shocked the world by announcing: “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.”

“Here is a man who in prayer discerned his own limits and said, ‘I can go so far, I do not have the strength to go further, and therefore I resign,’ according to that interview book,” O’Connell said. In His Own Words. He had a good feeling that he made the right decision.

Benedict’s efforts to revive Christianity in secularized Europe — which he said was threatened by a “dictatorship of relativism” — were overshadowed by the many crises of his papacy.

But his pursuit also created rifts with some communities. In 2006, Benedict infuriated Muslims around the world after referencing a historical quote that derided the faith. He later apologized. Benedict’s decision to lift the excommunication of a Holocaust denier hurt the Church’s relations with the Jewish community.

Muslim fury around the world was triggered by the quote. Benedict prayed silently next to a Muslim cleric at Istanbul’s Blue Mosque after visiting it a few months later.

The Magic of Pope Pius XII: When Hitler Met the Nazi Regime, His Apostolic Compassion and the Holocaust Became a Failure

He was 6 years old when Hitler came to power. His parents — a police officer and a hotel cook — were firm Catholics who opposed the Nazi regime, according to historian Michael Frassetto.

Ratzinger entered a seminary when he was 12. At the height of World War II, when he was in his teens, he joined the Hitler Youth, which was mandatory. He served in the military for a short time in 1943.

Benedict backed down a few times. In 2008, his reinstatement of the traditional Latin Mass, with its Good Friday prayer calling for the conversion of Jews, drew strong criticism from Jewish leaders, forcing the Vatican to change the prayer’s wording.

The relations between the Catholic and Jewish sides were damaged after Benedict lifted the excommunication of a bishop who had questioned the Holocaust. Following worldwide outrage, Benedict wrote a letter to his bishops acknowledging it was an “unforeseen mishap.” He said he didn’t know the bishop was a Holocaust denier. The pope said he was more attentive to the internet for information.

Nevertheless, Benedict again triggered widespread anger when he announced he was putting the World War II-era pope on the track to sainthood for what Benedict called his “heroic virtues.” Pope Pius XII is widely viewed as not having spoken out forcefully as the Holocaust was being carried out. The process of sainthood is still going on.

Church historian Massimo Faggioli said he believes that by approaching the world from a purely intellectual and theological perspective, Benedict’s papacy was ultimately a failure. Being pope is like being a pastor-in-chief. The magic of the papal office was said by Faggioli.

The event of the funeral of Benedict being presided over by Pope Francis was noted by the Holy See Press Office.

The former pope was elected in 2005, at the ripe age of 78, and became the oldest person to be elected in more than two centuries. He served for seven years before becoming the first pope to resign in nearly 600 years, citing his advanced age as a reason he was no longer suited to lead.

Coming into office, he was determined to strengthen the Catholic Church’s core beliefs and denounce modern trends that he believed were undermining Catholicism.