Cardinal Kurt Koch, prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, celebrated a memorial Mass for Pope Benedict XVI on December 31 at the late Pontiff’s tomb in the Vatican Grottoes.
It was the second of two Vatican memorial Masses for Pope Benedict. On the evening of December 30, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 2012 to 2017, was the principal celebrant at a memorial Mass at the Altar of the Chair in St. Peter’s Basilica.
Pope Benedict was elected to the papacy in 2005, resigned in 2013, and died on December 31, 2022, at the age of 95.