World
Former Pope Benedict XVI Dead at Age 95
Former Pope Benedict XVI, the first pontiff to resign in 600 years, died on Saturday at the age of 95 in the Vatican, according to a Holy See spokesman. “With sadness, I inform you that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI died today at 9.34 a.m. in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican,” a spokesman said in a written statement.
According to the Vatican, Pope Francis will preside over his predecessor’s funeral on January 5.
Benedict, the first German pope in 1,000 years, stepped down in 2013 due to failing health, leaving behind a Catholic Church beleaguered by sexual abuse scandals, mired in mismanagement, and divided between conservatives and progressives.
He had good relations with his successor, but his continued presence inside the Vatican after he stepped down polarized the Church ideologically even more.
Concerned about Pope Francis‘s progressive moves, conservatives looked to Benedict as the defender of tradition. Several times, he had to tell nostalgic visitors, “There is only one Pope, and his name is Francis.”
Pope Benedict, a pianist and formidable theologian, was a weak leader who struggled to impose himself on the opaque Vatican bureaucracy and stumbled from crisis to crisis during his eight-year reign.
He repeatedly apologized for the Church’s failure to root out clergy sexual abuse of children, and despite being the first pope to take serious action against abuse, his efforts failed to halt a rapid decline in church attendance in the West, particularly in Europe.
Pope Benedict XVI Resigns
In 2022, an independent report in his native Germany claimed Benedict failed to act in four abuse cases while serving as Archbishop of Munich between 1977 and 1982. After being shaken by the report, he apologized in an emotional personal letter and asked for forgiveness.
In a detailed rebuttal, his lawyers argued that he was not directly to blame.
Victims’ groups claimed that the evasive response squandered an opportunity arising from a scandal that shook the Church worldwide.
On February 11, 2013, Benedict shocked the world by announcing in Latin that he was resigning, telling cardinals that he was too old and frail to lead an institution with over 1.3 billion members.
It was always going to be difficult following the death of his charismatic predecessor, Pope John Paul II, in 2005, and Benedict admitted to difficulties in an emotional farewell address.
“There were happy and light moments, but there were also difficult moments.” “There were moments… when the seas were rough and the wind blew against us, and it seemed as if the Lord was sleeping,” Benedict said to a crowd of more than 150,000 people at his last general audience.
On February 28, 2013, Benedict took up residence at the papal summer retreat at Castelgandolfo, south of Rome, while cardinals from around the world gathered in the Vatican to elect his successor.
Pope Francis’ election
Prior to formally stepping down, Benedict and his aides chose the title “pope emeritus” and decided he would continue to wear a white cassock, albeit a slightly modified version. Some in the Church objected, claiming that he had tied his successor’s hands.
They said he should have dressed like a cardinal or a priest in red or black.
Following Pope Francis’ election on March 13, Benedict moved into a converted convent on Vatican grounds to spend his final years praying, reading, playing the piano, and receiving visitors.
He appeared in public only on rare occasions, usually for major Church ceremonies, though he paid an emotional visit to his ailing elder brother Georg, a priest, in Bavaria in June 2020. Georg died soon after, at the age of 96.
Benedict did not keep his promise to remain “hidden from the world,” and his writings in retirement occasionally caused controversy and confusion.
In a 2019 essay for a German Church magazine, he blamed the crisis over priest abuse of children on the 1960s sexual revolution, what he called homosexual cliques in seminaries, and a general collapse in morality.
Critics accused him of attempting to shift blame away from the institutional Church’s hierarchy. Conservatives, however, rejoiced, and rallied to his defense.
Benedict and the cardinal
The ambiguity surrounding Benedict’s role reached a head in January 2020, when it was revealed that he was involved in a book written by a conservative cardinal that some saw as an attempt to influence a document Pope Francis was preparing.
As a result, Francis fired Archbishop Georg Ganswein, Benedict’s secretary, from a top Vatican position. Many people believed Ganswein misled Benedict, the cardinal, or both as a middleman between Benedict and the cardinal.
Some Vatican officials have called for clear rules regarding the status of any future pontiff who resigns as a result of the incident.
Francis has stated that if he were to resign, he would prefer the title Emeritus Bishop of Rome, as suggested by some. He has also stated that he will not live in the Vatican but rather in a Rome home for retired priests.
Benedict, an uncompromising conservative on social and theological issues, literally cloaked himself in tradition during his papacy, frequently donning fur-trimmed capes and red shoes in public appearances — a stark contrast to his successor’s more humble, down-to-earth style.
He enraged Muslims by implying that Islam is inherently violent, and he enraged Jews by rehabilitating a Holocaust denier. The gaffes and blunders reached a climax in 2012, when leaked documents revealed corruption, intrigue, and feuding within the Vatican.
As a result of the “Vatileaks” case, his butler, Paolo Gabriele, was arrested and convicted of passing secret documents to a journalist. Benedict later forgave him. Gabriele was hired at a Vatican-owned hospital and died there in 2020.
Gay Clergy Lobby
The media speculated that the saga, which exposed allegations of a gay clergy lobby operating against the pope, might have put pressure on him to resign. Benedict insisted on stepping down because he could no longer bear the full weight of the papacy, including the exhausting international travel required by the job.
In a book-length interview published in 2016, he acknowledged his flaws but stated that his papacy was not a failure.
“Perhaps one of my weaknesses is a lack of resolve in governing and making decisions. In reality, I am more of a professor, someone who reflects and meditates on spiritual issues,” Benedict stated in the book “Last Testament,” written by German journalist Peter Seewald.
“Practical government is not my strong point and that is certainly a weakness. But I don’t consider myself a failure.” On April 16, 1927, in the southern German village of Marktl, close to Austria, Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger was born.
During World War II, he was forcibly enrolled in the Hitler Youth and briefly held as a prisoner of war by the Allies, but he was never a member of the Nazi party.
“Neither Ratzinger nor any member of his family were National Socialists,” wrote John Allen, a leading Church expert, in a biography of Benedict.
Ratzinger was ordained as a priest in 1951 and rose to prominence as a liberal theological adviser at the Second Vatican Council, which convened in 1962 and resulted in profound Church reform.
God’s Rottweiler
The Marxism and atheism of the 1968 student protests across Europe, on the other hand, prompted him to become more conservative in order to defend the faith against growing secularism.
After stints as a theology professor and then Archbishop of Munich, Ratzinger was appointed in 1981 to head the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), the successor office to the Inquisition, where he earned the epithet “God’s Rottweiler”.
After a period of experimentation, he and Pope John Paul agreed that traditional doctrine needed to be restored in the Church.
Ratzinger first addressed the popular “liberation theology” in Latin America, ordering the one-year silence of Brazilian friar Leonardo Boff in 1985, whose writings were criticized for using Marxist ideas.
Ratzinger applied pressure on theologians, primarily in Asia, who saw non-Christian religions as part of God’s plan for humanity in the 1990s.
Ratzinger’s office condemned “radical feminism” in a 2004 document as an ideology that undermined the family and obscured the natural differences between men and women.
Benedict sought to show the world the gentler side of his nature as Pope from 2005, but he never achieved the “rock star” status of John Paul or appeared particularly at ease in the job.
Child abuse scandals dogged him for the majority of his pontificate. He called for an official investigation into abuse in Ireland, which resulted in the resignation of several bishops.
During his pontificate, however, the Vatican’s relations with once-devoutly Catholic Ireland deteriorated. In 2011, Dublin closed its embassy to the Holy See.
Profound consternation
Victims demanded that the International Criminal Court investigate him. The Vatican ruled that he could not be held accountable for the crimes of others, and the court declined to hear the case.
In September 2013, he denied covering up the scandals. “As for your mentioning moral abuse of minors by priests, as you know, I can only acknowledge it with profound consternation.
“However, I never attempted to conceal these facts,” he wrote in a letter to Italian author Piergiorgio Odifreddi.
Benedict visited his homeland three times as Pope, confronting its dark past at the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz in Poland. As a “son of Germany,” he prayed and asked why God was silent when 1.5 million people, mostly Jews, died there during World War II.
One of his trips to Germany triggered the first major crisis of his pontificate. In a 2006 university lecture, he quoted a 14th century Byzantine emperor as saying that Islam had only brought evil to the world, which was spread by the sword.
Following protests that included attacks on churches in the Middle East and the killing of a nun in Somalia, the pope apologized for any confusion his speech had caused.
Later that year, in a move widely perceived as conciliatory, he made a historic trip to predominantly Muslim Turkey, praying in Istanbul’s Blue Mosque with the city’s grand mufti.
Offending the Jews
In 2008, the pope visited the United States, where he apologized for the sexual abuse scandal, promised that pedophile priests would be expelled, and consoled abuse victims. But Benedict made a series of errors in 2009.
After lifting the excommunication of four traditionalist bishops, one of whom was a notorious Holocaust denier, the Jewish world and many Catholics were outraged. Benedict later stated that the Vatican should have done more research on him.
Jews were offended again in December 2009, when he relaunched the process of resurrecting his wartime predecessor Pius XII, who was accused by some Jews of turning a blind eye to the Holocaust, after a two-year pause for reflection.
In March 2009, the Pope shocked the world by telling reporters on a plane flying to Africa that the use of condoms in the fight against AIDS only made matters worse.
Benedict preferred to appoint men he trusted at the Vatican, and some of his early appointments were questioned.
He appointed Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who had worked with him in the Vatican’s doctrinal office for years, as secretary of state, despite the fact that Bertone had no diplomatic experience. Bertone was later embroiled in a financial scandal involving the renovation of his Vatican apartment.
Pope Benedict wrote three encyclicals
Other religions criticized Benedict in 2007 when he approved a document that reiterated the Vatican’s position that non-Catholic Christian denominations were not full churches of Jesus Christ.
Critics saw his papacy as a concerted effort to reverse the reforms of the Second Vatican Council of 1962-1965, which modernized the Church in sometimes turbulent ways.
Some Council decisions were rewritten by Benedict to conform to traditional practices such as the Latin Mass and highly centralized Vatican rule. One of the themes he frequently returned to was the threat of relativism, which rejected the idea that moral values were not absolute but rather relative to those who held them and the times in which they lived.
Pope Benedict wrote three encyclicals, the most important type of papal document, including Spe Salvi (Saved by Hope), an attack on atheism, in 2007. The 2009 Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth) declaration called for a rethinking of how the global economy is run.
Despite the difficulties that came with having two men dressed in white in the Vatican, Francis developed a warm relationship with the man who was once dubbed “the Panzer Cardinal” and described it as being like having a grandfather in the house.
“He speaks little… but with the same profundity,” Francis once said.
World
Felipe VI of Spain Pelted with Mud By Angry Protesters
Angry protesters pelted Felipe VI of Spain with mud and other objects during a visit to flood-hit Valencia. Spain’s national broadcaster reported that two bodyguards were treated for injuries.
Felipe VI of Spain and Queen Letizia, Spain’s prime minister, and other leaders were met with shouts of “murderer” and “shame” as they traversed the town of Paiporta, which is one of the most severely afflicted in the region.
King Felipe and Queen Letizia were later observed offering comfort to individuals in the throng despite being covered in mud on their faces and clothing.
The floods, which were the most severe in Spain in decades, resulted in the deaths of over 200 individuals. In the hopes of locating survivors and recovering corpses, emergency personnel are still working to search underground car parks and tunnels.
In response to the floods, there has been a wave of resentment toward the authorities for their perceived failure to provide adequate support and warning.
The king was observed walking down a pedestrian street when a sudden surge of demonstrators who hurled insults and screamed, causing his bodyguards and police to be immediately overwhelmed.
Some of the demonstrators threw mud and objects, which made it difficult for them to maintain a protective ring around the monarch.
Felipe VI of Spain Greets Mob
Images depicted the king, queen, and entourage, who held canopies over the monarch as they departed, with mud on their faces and clothing.
During the visit, the royal couple was accompanied by Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and the president of the Valencian regional government, Carlos Mazón. However, they were promptly evacuated as the crowd became increasingly hostile.
The BBC has verified footage that appears to depict stones being thrown at Sánchez’s vehicle as he was driven away, while Spanish media reports that objects were hurled at him.
The audience chanted, “Where is Sánchez?” after he departed.
“I am only 16,” Pau said, his eyes welling with tears. “We are assisting, but the leaders are not acting.” People are still dying. I am unable to endure this any longer.
Another woman stated, “They abandoned us to our deaths.” We have forfeited everything: our homes, enterprises, and aspirations.
A subsequent observation revealed that the civil guard and mounted officers endeavored to disperse the irate throng.
Severe Flooding in Valencia province
The royal entourage intended to continue their journey to Chiva, another community in the Valencia province severely affected by the flooding. However, this visit has been postponed.
In a subsequent video on the royal household’s Instagram account, the monarch expressed his comprehension of the protestors’ “angry and frustration.”
Maribel Albalat, the mayor of Paiporta, said that she was astonished by the violence but also acknowledged the “frustration and desperation of the people.”
Juan Bordera, a Valencian parliamentarian, characterized the king’s visit as “an extremely poor decision.”
Mr. Bordera told the BBC authorities “didn’t heed any warnings.”
“It is logical that the people are angry, and it is logical that the people did not comprehend the urgency of this visit,” he continued.
Sánchez directed the deployment of 10,000 additional police officers, civil guards, and soldiers to the region on Saturday.
He stated that the deployment was the highest in Spain’s history during peacetime. However, he also acknowledged that the response was “insufficient” and that there were “severe issues and shortages.”
Over 200 Killed in Flooding
The inundation began on Tuesday following a period of heavy rainfall. Floodwaters caused bridges to collapse and cities to be engulfed in a thick layer of mud. Numerous communities lacked water, electricity, food, and other fundamental services.
The mortality toll from the flooding reached 217 on Sunday, and it is believed that many more individuals are still missing.
The Valencia region on the Mediterranean coast has been the site of nearly all of the confirmed fatalities thus far.
Certain regions have been particularly devastated. Today, the royal delegation visited Paiporta, a municipality where authorities have reported a minimum of 62 fatalities.
On Sunday, the Spanish meteorological agency AEMET issued the maximum alert level for certain areas of southern Valencia, including Alzira, Cullera, and Gandia.
The agency warned that the intensity of the cyclones expected to pass through the region will not be comparable to Tuesday’s. It anticipates a total of 90mm (3.45 inches) of precipitation.
Trending News:
At Least 95 People Die In Flash Floods In Spain
World
Oil Prices Fall As Reality Of Weak Global Demand Overtakes Risk Of Wider War In Middle East
Global oil prices are plummeting after Israel launched a retaliatory strike over the weekend that targeted Iranian military locations rather than its energy infrastructure, as had been anticipated.
Crude oil prices rose globally on October 2 after Iran launched roughly 200 missiles into Israel as part of a series of fast-increasing attacks between Israel, Iran, and its Arab allies that threatened to bring the Middle East closer to a regional war.
Iran is the world’s seventh-largest oil producer, but a bigger crisis in the Middle East may have an impact on the region’s largest energy producers.
Oil Prices Fall As Reality Of Weak Global Demand Overtakes Risk Of Wider War In Middle East
With many believing that the threat is receding in the short term, the price of benchmark U.S. crude and Brent crude, the worldwide benchmark, fell 6% on Monday. U.S. crude oil plunged well below $70 per barrel.
The Israeli military stated that its aircraft targeted Iranian facilities used to manufacture missiles fired at Israel, as well as surface-to-air missile installations.
Here’s a look at the current status and prospects for oil and gas prices:
The price of U.S. benchmark petroleum fell 6% Monday after Israel’s weekend retaliation strike on Iran targeted military targets rather than oilfields in the world’s seventh largest producer of crude.
This brings the price of a barrel of U.S. crude well below $70 after it rose above $77 earlier this month. Oil and gasoline prices have fallen dramatically since their yearly highs in April. According to energy specialists, more than half of the pumps in the United States sell a gallon of petrol for less than $3.
The focus has shifted back to the fundamentals of global energy markets, which have seen plentiful supply and falling demand this year. Slowing economic growth in China, the world’s largest energy consumer is a major cause.
Beijing announced that China’s economy grew at a 4.6% annual rate in the July-September quarter, down from 4.7% the previous quarter and falling short of the official aim of “about 5%” growth in 2024.
The Middle East war continues to roil energy markets, albeit not as dramatically.
Prices spiked momentarily this month after Iran launched missiles into Israel, but many experts believe Israel’s response over the weekend was moderate, potentially ending a cycle of retaliatory strikes from both sides, at least for now.
The OPEC+ coalition, which includes members of the producer’s cartel as well as ally countries such as Russia, wields less control over world pricing than in the 1970s when an oil embargo following the start of the Yom Kippur War in 1973 doubled crude oil prices.
Since then, the global oil supply has shifted dramatically, with the United States emerging as the world’s top producer. Months of conflict between Israel and two Iranian proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, did little to raise oil prices for OPEC and its 12 member countries. Only the prospect of a direct conflict between Israel and Iran shifted the needle.
It is the fundamentals.
The long-term expectation is that oil prices will fall rather than rise. This is due to a shift in the supply-demand balance, which normally causes oil prices to fall.
According to the International Energy Agency’s most recent energy market assessment, oil demand in the first half of this year increased by the least amount since 2020. Meanwhile, supplies have continued to rise, and the OPEC+ alliance has announced intentions to release more oil into the market beginning in December.
What’s happening with energy prices this year?
Oil futures soared sharply to start the year, reaching $85 per barrel in April, but it’s been mostly downhill since then, and gas prices have followed suit.
Because oil costs half of a gallon of gasoline in the United States, gas prices are loosely correlated. Between Friday and Monday, when Israel conducted a measured counterstrike against Iran, the price of a barrel of oil fell $4.
OPEC has failed to build a floor for oil prices this year.
Oil Prices Fall As Reality Of Weak Global Demand Overtakes Risk Of Wider War In Middle East
Saudi Arabia and other oil-producing countries extended output cutbacks until June next year, seeking to preserve low oil prices that have yet to recover despite Middle Eastern turbulence and this year’s summer travel season.
At the same time, the United States is pumping an unprecedented amount of petroleum. The United States Energy Information Administration predicts that the average daily crude oil output in the United States will be 13.2 million barrels annually, with production only expected to increase in 2025.
What’s next for oil and gas prices?
Several energy experts believe that oil prices have peaked this year and will continue to fall, implying that motorists will benefit from additional discounts.
“Limited nature of Israeli strikes against Iran should diminish fears of wider war and shave some of the geopolitical premium on crude oil,” said Tom Kloza, global head of energy analysis at the Oil Price Information Service, in a social media post this weekend. “Today’s U.S. retail gas avg is $3.13/gal with 55% of sites priced at less than $3/gal.”
SOURCE | AP
World
2024 | “Pink Cocaine” What Is It?
A recreational substance termed “pink cocaine” is gaining popularity and causing misunderstanding because it does not normally include cocaine.
The pink powder, which is actually a mix of other narcotics tinted pink, has been discovered in drug seizures, forcing law authorities to issue warnings.
Pink cocaine is also known as “tusi,” however both nicknames are based on marketing rather than fact. According to experts, it rarely contains cocaine and is more likely to contain ketamine, which has quite distinct effects.
What Is The Recreational Drug ‘Pink Cocaine’?
Why is it pink?
Pink cocaine gets its pink tint from food coloring or dye, according to Joseph Palamar, a drug trends researcher at NYU Langone Health in New York.
“Sometimes it has cocaine in the mix, but it’s typically more of a ketamine concoction,” says Palamar. Studies have discovered batches containing methamphetamine, MDMA, bath salts, caffeine, and opiates.
“It’s a concoction that anyone can make if they have a couple of drugs and a pink dye,” Palamar told reporters.
According to research released last year by Palamar, the term “tusi” may have been coined to emulate 2C-B, a recreational drug popular on the rave scene in the 1990s and noted for its euphoric effects. The drug analyses that Palamar evaluated revealed that tusi did not often include 2C-B.
According to him, young people nowadays may be unaware of the history of the name tusi and may be confused by the name pink cocaine.
“It’s just some beautiful powder that their pals are using. “They probably have no idea what it is supposed to be,” he explained.
Why is pink cocaine dangerous?
The threat stems from the unknown contents. Users may have undesirable side effects or take more than their previous experience indicates they can handle. Ketamine is a potent anesthetic that has been licensed for surgical usage, but it has also been used recreationally and to treat depression, anxiety, and pain in recent years. It has the potential to produce hallucinations as well as interfere with breathing and cardiac function.
What Is The Recreational Drug ‘Pink Cocaine’?
“Ketamine is not a fun drug to most people,” Palamar stated. “It kind of puts you in your own little world and things tend to feel very alien when you’re on it, especially in large doses.”
Someone who is drunk at a party and believes cocaine may counteract the effects of alcohol will be unpleasantly startled with pink cocaine, which is primarily ketamine, he added.
Where does pink cocaine come from?
In May, the United States Coast Guard reported seizing pink cocaine and other drugs off the shores of Mexico, Central and South America.
“That was the first time that I heard of large batches being imported into the U.S. as tusi,” Palamar told me. It might just as easily be created by drug dealers in the United States who mix their own, he claimed.
SOURCE | AP
-
Tech4 weeks ago
Documents Show OpenAI’s From Nonprofit to $157B Valued Company Long Trip
-
Business4 weeks ago
Experts Are Perplexed By Tesla’s Sporty, Two-Seater Robotaxi Design.
-
Tech2 weeks ago
Apple Unveiled A Fresh Glimpse Of Their AI Featuring ChatGPT Integration.
-
Tech3 weeks ago
Connection Problems With The App Store Are Stopping Customers From Downloading Apps.
-
Tech4 weeks ago
OpenAI Plans To Establish Offices In Paris, Singapore, And Brussels To Facilitate Global Development.
-
Business4 weeks ago
Uber And Lyft Stock Prices Surge After Telsa’s “Toothless” Robotaxi Revelation.