Regarding the announcement that Pope Benedict XVI is resigning the papal throne, Detroit Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron released the following statement. The archbishop also took questions at a morning news conference Feb. 11 at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, the details of which can be found here.

"Like most of my fellow-Catholics I woke this morning to the very surprising news that Our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI is resigning his service as the successor of St. Peter. Quickly after the surprise followed sadness, a sense of grief at losing his fatherly care for all us, bishops, clergy, and faithful. We have come to love him very much and will miss him.

Most of us know in our own personal lives what it means to see a parent grow old and decline in ability. That is the sense we bring to this announcement. Our spiritual father has determined, by the best light given to him in prayer, that for the good of us all he must lay down his office.

It was with the support of our daily prayers that Pope Benedict passed his years in the Chair of Peter and has come to this point. I invite all Catholics to pray all the more ardently for the Holy Father Pope Benedict, that God sustain him in these last weeks of his papacy and guide him through what lies ahead. And we look to the future with confidence, that the Lord who has given us this great pope and loving father, will give us a new shepherd of equal merit."
Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron
Archbishop of Detroit
11 February 2013