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At the Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe in downtown Dallas, black fabric framed the front doors as traditional sign of mourning for the death of a pope. Tolling bells, symbolic of the passing of the Roman Catholic Church’s highest leader, began a memorial Mass for Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI Thursday at noon.
Benedict XVI, who lead the Catholic Church from 2005-2013 before becoming the first pope in 600 years to resign, died Saturday, December 31, at the age of 95. He was laid to rest Thursday at the Vatican. North Texas Catholics gathered at the downtown Dallas cathedral for a memorial Mass where he was remembered as a leader and teacher.
Rev. Bishop Edward J. Burns, Bishop of Dallas, celebrated the Mass. In an interview, Burns described the late pope emeritus as “very bright, very soft spoken, slight in stature but a giant of a man.”
Burns said he had the opportunity to meet Benedict twice over the years, once when the pope appointed him to be bishop of the Diocese of Juno, Alaska and later during a diocesan trip to the Vatican.
During the homily, Burns spoke of Benedict’s retirement and praised him for recognizing the need for newer life at the helm of the Church. Benedict cited his advanced age and deteriorating health at the time of his resignation.
“When Pope Benedict XVI stepped aside from his Petrine ministry, he said it was in order to safeguard the teachings of the Church,” Burns said. “It was a selfless act on his part.”
A couple hundred people gathered to pay their respects in a sanctuary still decorated with evergreens and the Nativity scene. Before and after Mass, congregants signed a book of condolences to be sent to Pope Francis, who in 2013 succeeded Benedict Benedict XVI as pontiff.
At the front of the Cathedral near the pulpit, a red vestment stood on display next to a large portrait of the late pope emeritus. Diocese spokesperson Annette Gonzalez Taylor told the Dallas Morning News the vestment was worn by Benedict XVI before he was pope, when as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, hevisited Dallas in 1991.
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[17/17] Parishioner Ana Nino, left, greets her 11-month-old son Maximiloano Nino during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[1/17] Catalina Nino, 4, points her mother Ana towards the brochure during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[2/17] Bishop Edward J. Burns delivers his homily during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[3/17] Seminarians process out of the church following a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[4/17] Parishioner Andrea Carmona of Dallas prays during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[5/17] Priests are silhouetted as they enter the church during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[6/17] Four-month-old Cecilia Dobbs gets a kiss from her father Tyler as her mother Isabel prays during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[7/17] Seminarians process out of the church’s main entrance draped by black bunting symbolizing the death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[8/17] Decon Manuel Rendon, left, blesses three and half month old Ian Mendoza, carried accompanied by his mother Maria and father Ciro after a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[9/17] Orlando Saul Garcia kisses the vestment of late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI following a memorial mass at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. The vestment was worn by Pope Benedict who was then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger during his visit to Dallas in 1991. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[10/17] Priests engage as they read the brochure ahead of a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[11/17] Bishop Edward J. Burns venerates the Lectionary during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[12/17] Giselle Huerta sitting by her son Abdel Monasterio, 7, kneels as she prays during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[13/17] Auxiliary Bishop Gregory Kelly, second from left, alongside other pray ahead of a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[14/17] Bishop Edward J. Burns reads from the Roman Missal during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[15/17] A portrait and vestment of late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI during a memorial mass at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. The vestment was worn by Pope Benedict who was then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger during his visit to Dallas in 1991. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
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[16/17] The brochure for a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
[17/17] Parishioner Ana Nino, left, greets her 11-month-old son Maximiloano Nino during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
[1/17] Catalina Nino, 4, points her mother Ana towards the brochure during a memorial mass for late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023 in Dallas. (Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer)
Ana Niño, who attends St. Phillip the Apostle as their home parish, brought her family to the Cathedral at the request of her oldest child, 17-year old Gerardo Niño. Since she homeschools her six kids, the family had the liberty to attend the Mass in the middle of the day.
“He said it would be good for us to take the time to come and participate in the Mass,” she said.
Gerardo Niño said Benedict was the first pope he has memories of, as he became the pope the same year Gerardo was born. When Benedict became the pope emeritus, an almost unprecedented move in the Catholic Church, Gerardo Niño remembered feeling like he was “living in a piece of history.”
Legacy
Born Joseph Alois Ratzinger in Germany in 1927, Benedict leaves behind a legacy admired by some and found wanting by others.
Before his election as the 265th pope in 2005, he led the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, responsible for dealing with the clergy sexual abuse crisis, starting in 1982. Then-Cardinal Ratzinger was the one to assume responsibility of sex-abuse cases after he realized bishops around the world weren’t punishing abusers but were just moving them from parish to parish where they could rape again, the Associated Press reported.
From 2004-2014, the Vatican defrocked 848 priests and sanctioned another 2,572 to lesser penalties. Benedict XVI also took action against one of the time’s most notorious predator priests, the founder of the Mexico-based Legionaries of Christ religious order Rev. Marcial Maciel, reversing inaction on the part of his papal predecessor Pope John Paul II.
“He came down strong and hard on those who were found guilty of such crime,” Bishop Burns said of Benedict XVI during an interview.
Benedict XVI was the first in his office to meet with victims of clergy-sex abuse, however, he never admitted any failure of the Vatican in the crisis, according to an obituary by the Associated Press. In February 2022, Benedict was faulted in the handling of four cases in a report on sexual-abuse in a German diocese when he was archbishop in the 1970s and 1980s.
The retired pope later asked for forgiveness for any “grievous faults.”
“In our view, Pope Benedict XVI is taking decades of the church’s darkest secrets to his grave with him,” SNAP, a U.S.-based group of clergy abuse survivors that has a chapter in DFW, said in a press release following his death.
Burns said that Benedict’s legacy will remember him as an articulate teacher of the faith and as a pope who worked to unite the Church.
“He was truly both a shepherd and a teacher. He was truly an intellect and a pastor,” he said.
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Benedict XVI was also known as a defender of the traditional Latin Mass.
“That specific aspect of his legacy, meant a lot to us,” Tyler Dobbs said after the Mass at the downtown Dallas Cathedral, while holding his four-month-old daughter. “We actually had a traditional Latin Mass wedding when we got married.”
The traditional Latin Mass is practiced at Tyler Dobb’s and his wife Isabel Dobb’s home parish, Mater Dei, in Irving. The family also attended a rosary vigil for Benedict held at the Cathedral Wednesday night. Isabel Dobbs said their daughter Cecilia enjoys all outings including Mass, and has her own “rosary rattle,” shaped in a ring with five beads.
“We’re big admirers of Pope Benedict,” Tyler Dobbs said. “We wanted to pray for him and pay our respects,”