A prominent critic of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has resigned as the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo, after an adultery scandal.
Zimbabwe's state media in July published photographs of what it said was Pius Ncube in bed with a married woman who worked for his parish.
His lawyers called the allegations an orchestrated attempt to discredit him.
Bishop Ncube, 60, has this year called for mass street protests and foreign intervention to remove Mr Mugabe.
A brief statement from the Vatican said Pope Benedict XVI had accepted Bishop Ncube's resignation under the article of church law that says a bishop should retire if he is ill or if "some other grave reason" had made him unsuitable for office.
'Wicked regime'
Bishop Ncube says he offered to resign within days of the publication of the photographs, since when he has been keeping a low profile.
The woman's husband has sued him for 20bn Zimbabwe dollars (about $160,000, or £80,000, on the black market exchange rate) over the affair.
Bishop Ncube said he would remain a Catholic bishop in Zimbabwe, and would continue to speak out.
He said he would work with ordinary people and would not be "silenced by the crude machinations of a wicked regime".
Last month, Zimbabwe's Roman Catholic Bishops backed Bishop Ncube, praising him for "exposing the evils".
They said the attacks on him by the government and state media were "outrageous and utterly deplorable and constitute an assault on the Catholic Church".
In March, Bishop Ncube said he was prepared to stand in front of "blazing guns" at the front of street protests to bring down the government and urged other Zimbabweans to do the same.
Four months later, he said foreign powers should intervene to remove Mr Mugabe, saying this would be "the lesser of two evils".
The photos of him allegedly in bed with a married woman were published in state-owned media two weeks later.
'Dangerous path'
Former BBC Zimbabwe correspondent Grant Ferrett says Mr Ncube's hostility to Mr Mugabe's government stems from the massacres of his Ndebele people in the early 1980s.
An estimated 20,000 people were killed, mostly civilians, by a North Korean-trained brigade of the army.
President Robert Mugabe has reacted to criticism from the country's bishops by warning they were on a "dangerous path" if they became too political.
Zimbabwe has the world's highest rate of inflation - currently about 7,500% - and just one in five adults are in work.
The opposition says government critics are beaten up and even killed by state agents and supporters of Mr Mugabe.
The government denies such claims, saying there is a western plot to remove him from power.
Article first appeared on the BBC Website.