UPDATE NEWS COMMUNICATIONS 2013 : THE RESIGNATION OF POPE BENEDICT XVI.............

Cardinal Roger Mahony, the Archbishop Emeritus of Los Angeles, California; one of the eleven American Cardinals with a vote in the upcoming Conclave to elect a new Pope, was present with his brother prelates at the meeting three hours ago with Pope Benedict XVI, who officially retires in six hours from this blog post.  Cardinal Mahony tweeted following his brief farewell greeting with the outgoing Holy Father, sharing the words he spoke to +Benedict, : "When I greeted the Pope I asked him for his prayers for all the people in the greater Los Angeles area.  He grasped my hand and said, "Yes".  +Mahony further said in a second follow-up tweet, "Farewell meeting with the Pope Benedict XVI this morning; the final day of his active Pontificate.  Lord Jesus, bless and protect him".  Mahony is being criticized by vociferous opponents of his handling of sexual abuse of minors  and their victimizing priests, during his years as the Archbishop of Los Angeles, and it has been said by some that he not participate in the coming Conclave.  However, he has been blogging about his actions in recent weeks and is expected to go forward as an elector.  Along with strenuous criticism of Mahony, also being mentioned in the same way by abuse survivors and others, have been American prelates, Francis Cardinal George, the Archbishop of Chicago, Illinois; and a Conclave elector - and Justin Cardinal Rigali, Archbishop of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; also an elector in the approaching Conclave.  Should one, or all three of these Cardinals withdraw from the Conclave, as Keith Cardinal O'Brien, former Archbishop of Str. Andrews Edinburgh, in Scotland did on Monday, now repoorted at as at the behest of the Vatican; a severely diminished number of eligible electors might well remain, as the worldwide occurrence of serious mishandling by bishops and their staffs was endemic up until the crisis became public and has unfolded over the past decade plus, seven of those eleven years, during this outgoing Pontificate.  Undeniably, one of the leading needs the new Pope will have to effectively address and cleanse//reform/renew the Church from is the scandal of the sexual abuse crisis.  To that end one of the Cardinal Archbishops participating in the Conclave to be, is an American, Capuchin Franciscan +Sean Cardinal O'Malley, the Archbishop of Boston, Massachusetts; who has been stellar in responding to, and cleaning up the sexual abuse scandal in Boston, the Archdiocese during the service of Bernard Cardinal Law, that triggered the fall-out from the abuse scandal, nationally and globally.............tdp