The past few years have been very busy for Pope Benedict XVI. In addition to all of his travels, meetings with bishops, and pastoral duties as the bishop of Rome, he has had to deal with a number of challenging crises: sex-abuse scandals in Europe and elsewhere, persecution against Christians in the Middle East, and the AIDS epidemic in Africa, to name just a few. In a recent interview, the pope admitted that all of this is a consuming, exhausting job that demands long hours and intense concentration.