Pope resignation: cardinal criticises Benedict XVI on last day Australia's most senior Catholic cleric also said the 85-year-old pontiff's decision to resign - the first pope to do so since the Middle Ages - set a worrying precedent for the Church. "People who, for example, might disagree with a future pope, will mount a campaign to get him to resign," he suggested. He said the German pontiff, formerly Joseph Ratzinger, had been "well aware that this was a break with tradition, slightly destabilising." Asked what he would be seeking in the next pope, Cardinal Pell said he wanted somebody "who'll maintain the tradition, both in faith and especially in morals, where it's under attack." "I want somebody who is able to speak to the world," he said. And also I would like somebody with strong pastoral experience in a diocese who is able to lift the morale of the Roman Curia, and perhaps provide a bit more discipline. Benedict bid an emotional farewell on Wednesday to some 150,000 pilgrims in St Peter's Square, speaking of the "stormy waters" of multiple scandals and Vatican infighting that have plagued his tenure. The scourge of paedophile priests and cover-ups by their superiors cast a dark shadow over Benedict's papacy, combined with a long-standing money-laundering scandal at the Vatican bank and the Vatileaks controversy.