It will hold conferences around the world to pontificate on various global ills, real or imagined.
For us it's easy to pontificate that the same holds true today with the new Nifty Fifty.
Benedict took extraordinary measures to bring the society back under Rome's wing during his pontificate, but negotiations stalled.
The financial press will start writing and talking about a growth recession, and they'll find a car-load of economists to pontificate at length.
Fr Drew Christiansen, a Jesuit priest and visiting scholar at Boston College, says it is one of the key shortcomings of the pontificate.
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But I can't help but think it is easier for pundits to pontificate about Christie's weight than to examine his record in Trenton.
So for the second annual Forbes 400 Summit (last year it was Warren Buffett and Jay-Z) Moskovitz, 27, was eager to hear today's greatest philanthropist pontificate.
The experience of the early years of John Paul II's pontificate proves that energy and charisma can revitalize the church without surrendering entirely to modern thinking.
But assuming there is more evidence of such efforts waiting to emerge from the archives, it will undoubtedly help assuage the strong Catholic-Jewish tensions over that controversial pontificate.
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However, the piazza's oval contours didn't brim with faithful the way it did in the early days of his pontificate, following the death of his predecessor, John Paul II.
Peter's Basilica was somber during the Mass, as if the weight of Benedict's decision and the finality of his pontificate had finally registered with the thousands of faithful present.
After his brief pontificate of just 33 days, the new pope took the name John Paul II, he said to provide continuity in respecting the wishes of his short-lived predecessor.
Posture and pontificate as they might, Julia Gillard, the prime minister and Labor leader, and Tony Abbott, the right-wing coalition leader, were both rejected for being several hat-sizes too big.
But his pontificate was marred by ongoing communication blunders.
Peter's Basilica on Tuesday as Cardinal Angelo Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals, offered thanks for the "brilliant pontificate" of Benedict, whose unexpected resignation precipitated the selection of a new pope.
His "Fisherman's Ring", the special signet ring which contains the Pope's name and is impressed to validate certain official documents, is expected to be destroyed along with the lead seal of the pontificate.
The Vatican Bank came under suspicion of money-laundering and failure to conform to international banking regulations during Benedict's pontificate, and its director was forced to resign last year after a stormy board meeting.
The Pope is to spend his final hours at his Vatican residence saying farewell to the cardinals who have been his closest aides during his eight-year pontificate, says the BBC's David Willey at the Vatican.
The cape has since come to symbolize his rejection of the trappings of the papacy and to some degree the pontificate of Benedict XVI, since the German pontiff relished in resurrecting many of the liturgical vestments of his predecessors.
Although many liberal Catholics were impressed by the gentleness of Benedict's style as Pope - another of his surprises - the conservative views he adopted in the aftermath of the 1960s student revolutions had a profound impact on his pontificate.
Whoever he is, the next pope will face a church in crisis: Benedict spent his eight-year pontificate trying to revive Catholicism amid the secular trends that have made it almost irrelevant in places like Europe, once a stronghold of Christianity.
But because of burdens he inherited and ongoing problems in his own pontificate, Benedict fell short of the mark he set for himself on unifying the church, building relationships with other religions and restoring the church's influence in broader society.
"Since the beginning of my pontificate I have had occasion to express my wish to continue to establish bridges of friendship with believers of all religions, showing particularly my appreciation in the belief in dialogue between Muslims and Christians, " he said.
That echoed his efforts to define the early days of his pontificate through gestures of humility, taking the minibus instead of the papal motorcade and stopping by the hotel he used as a cardinal elector to collect his bags and pay the bill.
On the final day of Benedict's pontificate, Dolan stood with seminarians on the roof of the North American College and waved as a helicopter flew overhead, carrying the departing pope to what will be his temporary retirement home, the papal retreat in Castel Gandolfo.
In my early years as a consultant and business coach, I would often sit in rooms where a highly paid guru from Bain or McKinsey or Accenture would pontificate to a group of execs about their business and how they should run it.
"At the very beginning of my Pontificate, I wish to assure you that the Church remains firmly committed, in her catechesis and in every aspect of her life, to implementing this decisive teaching, " he told the 25 delegates led by an American rabbi, Israel Singer.
The pontificate which has just ended has, however, already come under heavy criticism by some Catholic groups, and many outside the Church for its failure to deal with some of the most pressing issues facing the world's oldest international organisation at the beginning of the third Christian millennium.
Instead, there may be something to be gained by leaning less on modern gurus who pontificate about such things as best in class and more toward Aristotle, who defined virtue not in terms of maximum excellence, but as a habit of choosing the mean lying between the extremes.
Well, with films people have actually seen and enjoyed nominated in a major category, perhaps the awards show will attract viewers who might not care to see Paul Haggis pontificate on the state of race relations amongst narcissistic Angelinos, but would tune in to see whether the Farrelly Brothers, Christopher Guest, or Alyson Hannigan take home a statue.
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