German town named after Pope Benedict

Berlin, Apr 24: A largely Protestant town in Germany today became the first place in the country to name a square after Pope Benedict, authorities said.

''According to our information, we're actually the only place in Europe to have done so,'' Torsten Harms, the mayor of Wathlingen in northern Germany, told Reuters.

Harms said most of Wathlingen's 6,300 inhabitants were Protestant. ''We only have 500 Catholics here,'' he said.

Before a crowd of 200 locals, town officials officially consecrated the square ''Pope Benedict XVI Platz (Square)''. It had formerly carried the name ''Am Bahnhof'' (At the station).

Harms said the idea of renaming the square had come after the Bavarian-born Benedict attended the Catholic Church's World Youth Day festival in Cologne last year. However, putting the plan into action proved problematic, he said.

While local politicians from the Greens and the Social Democrats first supported the plan, they later backed down. So the Christian Democrats -- the party of Chancellor Angela Merkel -- used its majority on the town council to push it through.

Reuters