He thanked the Roman Catholic faithful in several languages and said it was not appropriate for him to continue as pope.
"I've decided to resign
the ministry given to me by the Lord. I've done this in full freedom,
for the benefit of the church," he told those gathered in a Vatican City
audience hall for his regular weekly appearance.
Benedict said he is fully
aware of the gravity of his decision but he could not carry on as pope
"if I don't have the strength that it requires."
He appeared tired but not visibly unwell as he sat and read his remarks off several sheets of paper.
Benedict will also celebrate an Ash Wednesday mass marking the beginning of Lent at St. Peter's Basilica in the afternoon.
The service has been
moved from St. Sabina Church, where it is traditionally held, to the
Basilica to accommodate the crowd of worshipers expected to attend,
Vatican officials said.
The news Monday that
Benedict was stepping down at the end of February "because of advanced
age" shocked the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics.
He is the first pope to resign in nearly 600 years.
Benedict will keep
working until February 28, meeting with pastors from Rome, Italian
bishops, and the visiting presidents of Romania, Guatemala and other
countries, according to the Vatican press office.
He will hold a final
audience in Vatican City's St. Peter's Square on February 27, but the
church is not planning a formal ceremony to mark the pope's departure,
the Rev. Federico Lombardi, a spokesman for the Vatican, said Wednesday.
Benedict will simply leave at the end of his typical workday -- 8 p.m. in Vatican City, Lombardi said.
The pontiff, born Joseph
Ratzinger, will first go to the pope's summer residence in Castel
Gandolfo, and then is likely to retire to a monastery and devote himself
to a life of reflection and prayer, Lombardi said.
He won't be involved in managing the church after his resignation.
"The pope is well and
his soul is serene. He did not resign the pontificate because he is ill
but because of the fragility that comes with old age," Lombardi said.
The pope's decision was
not linked to a recent medical intervention to replace the battery in
his pacemaker, Lombardi said, adding that it had been a routine
procedure.
Benedict's unexpected move has inevitably prompted frenzied speculation over who might assume the papacy in his place.
Opinion: Huge challenges await next pope
The Vatican does not yet know when the cardinals will meet in a conclave to decide who will replace Benedict, but it must begin within 20 days of the pope's resignation, Lombardi said.
He had previously said a new pope would be in place before Easter is celebrated at the end of March.
While Benedict won't be
directly involved in his successor's selection, his influence will
undoubtedly be felt. He appointed 67 of the 117 cardinals that are set
to make the decision.
The number of electors
could drop to 115, as two cardinals will turn 80 in March, when their
age makes them ineligible to cast a vote. More than two-thirds of the
final number of cardinals must agree on the next pope. The announcement
that a decision has been made will come in the form of a puff of white
smoke emerging from a chimney in the Vatican.
Much speculation has
focused on whether Benedict's successor might come from Africa or Latin
America, rather than Europe, where Roman Catholic congregations are
shrinking.
The pope's older
brother, the Rev. Georg Ratzinger, speaking in Regensburg, Germany, said
he expected to see a pope chosen from outside Europe one day -- but not
just yet.
"I'm certain a pope will
come from the new continents but whether it will be now, I have my
doubts," he said. "In Europe, we have many very able people, and the
Africans are still not so well known and maybe do not have the
experience yet."
Opinion: Echoes of past in pope's resignation
Among those considered
frontrunners for the role are Cardinal Angelo Scola, archbishop of
Milan; Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet, who heads the Vatican's office of
bishops; Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, an Argentinian; and Cardinal Peter
Turkson of Ghana.
Whoever gets the nod, the selection of a new pontiff is expected to go smoothly.
"We're not going to have
a problem of two competing popes. If Pope Benedict still wanted to have
influence, he wouldn't have stepped down," said senior Vatican
communications adviser Greg Burke.
While not quite
unprecedented, Benedict's resignation is certainly historic. The last
pope to step down before his death was Gregory XII, who in 1415 quit to
end a civil war within the church in which more than one man claimed to
be pope.
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