Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI (; ; ; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger; ; 16 April 1927) served as Pope of the Catholic Church and as sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2005 until his resignation in 2013. Benedict's election as pope occurred in the 2005 papal conclave that followed the death of Pope John Paul II. The Vatican announced his withdrawal by bestowing him the title Pope Emeritus shortly after his resignation. Ordained as a priest in 1951 in his native Bavaria, Ratzinger had established himself as a highly regarded university theologian by the late 1950s and was
Georg Ratzinger (politician) at Berchtesgaden; 1870-71 he was editor of the journal "Fränkisches Volksblatt" at Würzburg; 1872–74, chaplain at Landshut, then editor, until 1876, of the "Volksfreund", at Munich. He was a member of the Parliament of Bavaria from 1875 to 1878 and of the German Reichstag from 1877 to 1878. During this period he belonged to the Centre Party. He combined the roles of priest and politician in a way which his grandnephew, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, rejected. With exception of a pastorate of three years at Günzelhafen, 1885–1888, he lived for a number of years at Munich, where