STUDENTS at the seminary where Joseph Ratzinger studied for the priesthood as a teenager in the 1940s erupted in cheers yesterday at the news that their townsman had become the leader of the Roman Catholic Church.

Students at the seminary where Joseph Ratzinger studied for the priesthood as a teenager in the 1940s erupted in cheers today at the news that their townsman had become the leader of the Roman Catholic Church.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger alienated some Roman Catholics in Germany with his zeal enforcing church orthodoxy. But in the conservative Alpine foothills of Bavaria where he grew up, he remains a favourite son who many think will make a good pope.