New life starts with TV, snooze

Pope Benedict XVI blesses faithful during his weekly general audience at the Vatican. Source: AFP

Faithful watch a giant screen showing Pope Benedict XVI in St Peter's Square on the day of his last public appearance as pontiff. (AP Photo/Dmitry Lovetsky) Source: AP

BENEDICT XVI has begun his life of retirement by watching some television, getting a good night's sleep and reciting the rosary, the Vatican says.

After bidding the faithful a final emotional farewell on Thursday, the Pope had dinner and then watched television news broadcasts about his departure.

"He really appreciated the coverage," spokesman Federico Lombardi said on Friday, adding: "A Pope can also appreciate good media work in his heart".

Afterwards, the Pope Emeritus paced up and down a long reception room, the Hall of the Swiss, overlooking Albano Lake in his new temporary residence of Castel Gandolfo near Rome in the final moments of his eight-year pontificate.

"He then retired for prayer and rest," said Mr Lombardi, who still referred to the ex-pontiff as "Pope" on the first day of a popeless interim for the Catholic Church ahead of a conclave this month to elect a successor.

Mr Lombardi said the Pope had brought a few books with him on theological and historical themes including one titled Hans Urs von Balthasar's Theological Aesthetics: A Model for Post-Critical Biblical Interpretation.

The Vatican spokesman also revealed that Benedict - an accomplished pianist - has been playing the piano more frequently in the run-up to the resignation although the piano remained silent on the night of his departure.

"The Pope slept really well. This morning he celebrated mass," Mr Lombardi said, adding that later in the day Benedict would probably have lunch and recite the rosary on a quiet walk in the gardens of Castel Gandolfo palace.

While Benedict rested Catholic cardinals from around the world begun preparing for a conclave to elect a new pope.

Letters were due to be sent inviting the cardinals to take part in meetings next week that will set the date for a conclave under Michelangelo's frescos in the Sistine Chapel.

The meetings - known as "general congregations" - will also be a way of vetting possible candidates to be leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics at a difficult time for the Church.

The conclave is to start in the first half of March.

After an emotional final day as pope on Thursday, world newspapers paid tribute to the 85-year-old German pope's historic decision, which could set a precedent for ageing popes in the future.

"Farewells made with courage, humility and grace," ran a headline on an editorial in the German conservative daily Die Welt, while top-selling tabloid Bild said: "Our pope has retired."

"This is how great popes go," said Italian daily Il Messaggero, hailing the "greatness of his humility, the simple step of a pilgrim".

La Repubblica daily said the 85-year-old Benedict's troubled eight-year reign had ended abruptly "not with an apocalypse, but with the sigh or relief of a man who became man again."

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Vatican Secretary of State, at centre with red skull cap, officially takes over the vacant See as camerlengo, chamberlain, before sealing Pope Benedict XVI's apartment, after Benedict left the Vatican. (AP Photo/L'Osservatore Romano, ho) Source: AP

Benedict's final hours as pope were filled with ritual and emotion, from the pealing bells of St Peter's Basilica to the Swiss Guards who shut the giant doors of his new temporary residence of Castel Gandolfo near Rome to mark the moment that Benedict was no longer pope.

The Vatican flag flying over the palace was lowered as the Swiss Guards - the papacy's military corps since the 15th century - formally completed their mission to protect the pope.

"Long live the pope!" a crowd outside chanted as a clock chimed the hour that Benedict said he would step down in an announcement earlier this month that stunned the world.

"I will no longer be pope but a simple pilgrim," the pope told supporters earlier after arriving at Castel Gandolfo from the Vatican in a helicopter that flew as the bells of St Peter's rang out.

A placard in Rome pays tribute to the papcy of Benedict XVI. AFP HOTO / GABRIEL BOUYS Source: AFP

German Chancellor Angela Merkel attended a mass in Berlin to mark the pope's last day in office and at a special mass in New York's Saint Patrick's Cathedral hundreds of worshippers paid homage.

Many ordinary Catholics hope the next pope will breathe new life into a Church hit hard by rising secularism in the West and discrimination against Christians in some developing countries.

The former pope Benedict will now be known as "Roman pontiff emeritus" - a completely new title created especially for this new situation.

He will still be addressed as "Your Holiness".

In a last tweet sent from his @pontifex Twitter account as he left the Vatican, the pope said: "Thank you for your love and support."

"May you always experience the joy that comes from putting Christ at the centre of your lives."

Benedict is only the second pope to resign in the Church's 2000-year history, and in his final hours as pontiff he took the highly unusual step of pledging allegiance to his successor.

"Among you there is also the future pope to whom I promise my unconditional obedience and reverence," the pope said to 144 cardinals in the ornate Clementine Hall in the Vatican.

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