Editing Pope Benedict XVI (section)

=== Wartime and ordination ===
Ratzinger's family, especially his father, bitterly resented the [[Nazis]], and his father's opposition to Nazism resulted in demotions and harassment of the family.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Landler |first1=Mark |last2=Bernstein |first2=Richard |title=A Future Pope Is Recalled: A Lover of Cats and Mozart, Dazzled by Church as a Boy |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/22/international/worldspecial2/22germany.html?pagewanted=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1114340564-13zVUfWUfsfMLXhqWFxrDA&_r=0 |work=The New York Times |date=22 April 2005}}</ref> Following his 14th birthday in 1941, Ratzinger was conscripted into the [[Hitler Youth]]{{snd}}as membership was required by law for all 14-year-old German boys after March 1939<ref>[http://www.verfassungen.de/de/de33-45/hitlerjugend36.htm Zweite Durchführungsverordnung zum Gesetz über die Hitler-Jugend (Jugenddienstverordnung) vom 25. März 1939] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170823011251/http://www.verfassungen.de/de/de33-45/hitlerjugend36.htm |date=23 August 2017 }} (§ 1)</ref>{{snd}}but was an unenthusiastic member who refused to attend meetings, according to his brother.<ref name="USAToday_20050423">{{cite news |work=USA Today |title=New Pope Defied Nazis As Teen During WWII |date=23 April 2005 |url=https://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-04-23-new-pope-defied-Nazis_x.htm |url-status=live |access-date=10 July 2009 |agency=Associated Press |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120104205507/http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-04-23-new-pope-defied-Nazis_x.htm |archive-date=4 January 2012}}</ref> In 1941, one of Ratzinger's cousins, a 14-year-old boy with [[Down syndrome]], was taken away by the Nazi regime and murdered during the ''[[Aktion T4]]'' campaign of [[Nazi eugenics]].<ref>{{cite news |first=John |last=Allen |author-link=John L. Allen Jr. |title=Anti-Nazi Prelate Beatified |url=http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word101405.htm#five |work=The Word from Rome |publisher=National Catholic Reporter |date=14 October 2005 |access-date=15 April 2008}}</ref> In 1943, while still in seminary, he was drafted into the German anti-aircraft corps as [[Luftwaffenhelfer]].<ref name="USAToday_20050423" /> Ratzinger then trained in the German infantry.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pope Benedict XVI |last2=Thornton |first2=John F. |last3=Varenne |first3=Susan B. |title=The Essential Pope Benedict XVI: His Central Writings and Speeches |year=2007 |publisher=HarperCollins |isbn=978-0-06-112883-7 |pages=xxxix–xl |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6tK0s971r_cC}}</ref> As the Allied front drew closer to his post in 1945, he deserted back to his family's home in Traunstein after his unit had ceased to exist, just as American troops established a headquarters in the Ratzinger household.<ref name="FoxNews_19April2005">{{cite web|url=https://www.foxnews.com/story/pope-recalls-being-german-pow|title=Pope Recalls Being German POW|publisher=Fox News|access-date=9 December 2018|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130607043032/http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,153942,00.html|archive-date=7 June 2013}}</ref> As a German soldier, he was [[interned]] in US [[prisoner of war]] camps, first in Neu-Ulm, then at Fliegerhorst ("military airfield") Bad Aibling (shortly to be repurposed as [[Bad Aibling Station]]) where he was at the time of [[Victory in Europe Day]], and released on 19 June 1945.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ratzinger |first=Josef Kardinal |title=Salz der Erde |collaboration=Seewald, Peter |publisher=Wilhelm Heyne Verlag |year=2004 |isbn=3-453-87942-2 |edition=2nd |location=Munich, Germany |pages=61 |language=de}}</ref><ref name="FoxNews_19April2005" />

Ratzinger and his brother Georg entered Saint Michael Seminary in Traunstein in November 1945, later studying at the [[Ducal Georgianum]] ({{lang|de|Herzogliches Georgianum}}) of the [[Ludwig Maximilian University]] in Munich. They were both ordained in [[Freising]] on 29 June 1951 by Cardinal Michael von Faulhaber of Munich{{snds}}the same man Ratzinger had met as a child. He recalled: "at the moment the elderly Archbishop laid his hands on me, a little bird{{snds}}perhaps a lark{{snds}}flew up from the altar in the high cathedral and trilled a little joyful song".<ref>{{cite book |title=Milestones: Memoirs 1927–1977 |url=https://archive.org/details/milestonesmemoir00ratz/page/99 | url-access=registration |page=99 | publisher=Ignatius Press| year=1998 |isbn=978-0-89870-702-1 |last=Ratzinger |first=Joseph Cardinal |translator-last=Leiva-Merikakis |translator-first=Erasmo}}</ref> He celebrated his first Mass later that summer in Traunstein, at St. Oswald's Church.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Pectoral cross of Benedict XVI stolen from Bavarian church |url=https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/254619/pectoral-cross-of-benedict-xvi-stolen-from-bavarian-church |access-date=21 June 2023 |agency=Catholic News Agency |language=en}}</ref>

Ratzinger's 1953 dissertation was on [[Augustine of Hippo]] and was titled ''The People and the House of God in Augustine's Doctrine of the Church''. His [[habilitation]] (which qualified him for a professorship) was on [[Bonaventure]]. It was completed in 1957 and he became a professor at Freising College in 1958.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Biographical notes of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/biography/documents/hf_ben-xvi_bio_20050419_short-biography_old.html |access-date=31 December 2022 |website=vatican.va}}</ref>