Pope Benedict XVI pledged yesterday to work to unify all Christians, reach out to other religions and continue implementing the Second Vatican Council as he outlined his goals and made clear his pontificate would follow closely the trajectory of his predecessor, Pope John Paul II.
Benedict, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, listed top priorities of his pontificate in a lengthy message read in Latin to cardinals gathered in the Sistine Chapel for the first Mass celebrated by the 265th leader of the Roman Catholic Church.
He said his "primary task" would be to work without fail to reunify all Christians and that sentiment alone was not enough.
"Concrete acts that enter souls and move consciences are needed," he said.
He said he wanted to continue "an open and sincere dialogue" with other religions and would do everything in his power to improve the ecumenical cause.
The message was clearly designed to show that Benedict was intent on following many of the groundbreaking paths charted by Pope John Paul II, who had made reaching out to other religions and trying to heal the 1,000-year-old schism in Christianity a hallmark of his pontificate.
John Paul, with Benedict as his doctrinal enforcer, supported council reforms but cracked down on what both men considered excesses spawned by the changes, including calls for priests to be allowed to marry and admission of women into the priesthood.
The Vatican's hard-line enforcer of church orthodoxy under John Paul II for almost 25 years, Benedict had gone into the two-day conclave one of the favorites. He emerged Tuesday as the oldest pontiff at the time of his election in 275 years and the first Germanic pope in almost a millennium.
A wildly cheering crowd of more than 100,000 welcomed Benedict when he stepped onto the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica as dusk fell Tuesday and gave his first blessing as pope.
Pilgrims on St. Peter's Square shouted "Benedetto!" and "Viva il Papa," waved national flags, hugged their neighbors and jumped in joy. Many shed tears of bliss; some wept in disappointment.
Benedict turned 78 on Saturday, the oldest Pope elected since Clement XII in 1730. His age clearly was a factor among cardinals who favored a "transitional" Pope who could skillfully lead the church as it absorbs John Paul II's legacy, rather than a younger cardinal who could wind up with another long pontificate.
A conservative on issues such as homosexuality, the ordination of women and lifting the celibacy requirement for priests, Benedict has led the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith -- a position he used to discipline church dissidents and uphold church policy against attempts at reform by liberals and activist priests.
Joy over the selection of a new pope immediately mixed with worries that Benedict could polarize a global church.
also see story:
New Pope Benedict XVI to follow a conservative path
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