What to make of Pope Benedict XVI

Catholic populations are growing in the South America and Africa

(It is difficult for a Protestant to know how to understand the different currents in the Roman Catholic Church. The scandals of abuse by priests against children weigh heavily. Liberal proponents in the West want a more 'contemporary minded' pope in Rome. This quote, from an Anglican in South Carolina, William McKeachie, briefly notes Benedict's contribution in biblical theology. My Protestant friends in South America might not take such a compassionate stance, and Liberals in North America will have a different view, based on 'progressive' secularism.)

"Although I am no fan of the Curial system, of Tridentine ecclesiology, or of Rome’s soteriological compromises in dogma, it seems to this Anglican that Joseph Ratzinger was the providentially right man in the right job(s) for the last several decades.

He has helped steer the Roman Catholic Church closer to mutuality with Bible believing Protestants to a greater degree than any other pope since the Reformation; he has been a true mentor for orthodox Christians of many denominational stripes and an incomparably better biblical theologian than many who call themselves Protestant; and there has been no more stalwart spiritual warrior against the ideological assault on Christian civilization from without, and its betrayal from within, among his generation.
In the face of the twin twenty - first century threats to the Gospel from Mohammedanism [Islam] and Secularism, all adherents of Nicene Christianity are better equipped spiritually and intellectually to “fight the good fight” than they were before Benedict XVI’s pontificate.

As we await the emergence of his successor, thanksgiving for the servant leadership of Joseph Ratzinger during the last half century should be both oecumenical and fervent." Quoted from William McKeachie, March 6, 2013