The Pope is Peter, “This Rock,” and is the focal point for the continuation of Christ’s Church. But the individual Pope is not the Church; otherwise, there would have been no Pope after St Peter.
We have had many bad popes, many indifferent popes, and a few saintly popes. We have had 265 Popes since St Peter, but the Church is still with us. Most of the popes died in office; some of the early popes died in the salt mines during the persecutions, some died at the hands of national powers, some died in disgraceful circumstances, and some died at the hands of corrupt clergy in their own households. But the Church is still with us.
Our Lord only promised that the Church, His Church, would endure, not that an individual Pope would be with us forever. BXVI is leaving for a good reason: I don’t know if you saw his last mass, but he had to be helped from point to point by people on either side of him and I doubt that he is going to live much longer.
I don’t know what medical problem he has, but it has become very acute in the last few months and he has changed enormously. He is frail and out of breath and is barely audible when he speaks. His mind seems to be just fine, judging by the addresses he has given in the last few days, but his body simply is not holding up.
Rather than let the Church grind to a halt while he dies, during a time when the Church has rarely been under more pressure, both from the left and from Islam, he has decided that the times are so urgent that someone physically capable of dealing with it must be called out of the ranks to lead the battle.
I think that is an honorable and good thing and God will reward his faithful servant as He should.
Great response.