Peter Seewald, chronic insomnia ultimately led to Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to resign in 2013.
Pope Benedict XVI revealed in a letter to his biographer that insomnia was the “central reason” why resigned in 2013. / Paul Badde/CNA
CNA Newsroom, Jan 29, 2023 / 07:15 am (CNA).
According to papal biographer Peter Seewald, chronic insomnia ultimately led to Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to resign in 2013.
In his last letter to the biographer — dated Oct. 28, 2022 — Benedict wrote the “central motive” for his resignation from office was “insomnia,” Seewald said according to a Jan. 27 report by CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language news partner.
The pontiff, who died Dec. 31, 2022, also wrote that insomnia had accompanied him “continuously since World Youth Day in Cologne.”
The 2005 World Youth Day in Cologne took place a few months after Benedict’s election and was his first papal journey.
The Bavarian-born pontiff served for nearly eight more years before announcing he was stepping down — citing waning strength — on Feb. 11, 2013.
Confirming a German media report, Seewald told agency KNA that Benedict XVI had not wanted to “make a fuss about the closer circumstances of his resignation, which was justified by his exhaustion,” while still alive.
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