Ten Things You Should Know About Pope Benedict XVI

Encyclicals are letters or “circulars” to a group — in this case, a group of Bishops — (from the Greek word egkyklios; –kyklos means circle).

The pope wrote three encyclicals: Deus Caritas Est (God is Love), the first half written by Pope Benedict in 2005 and the second half by the previous Pope John Paul II; Spe Salvi (Saved by Hope); Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth or Love in Truth) in which he urged a return to ethics in business and politics.

Pope Benedict’s books are mostly about theology. As Father Joseph Ratzinger, he was a professor of theology at universities in Germany before he became a Bishop and then a Cardinal.