Convalescing pope talks of healing as he misses another Angelus
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Pope Francis was again absent on March 30 for the Angelus, normally delivered at midday from a window of the Apostolic Palace overlooking Saint Peter’s Square.
PHOTO: AFP
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VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis, who is recovering from a life-threatening bout of pneumonia, urged Catholics on March 30 to mark Lent as a “time of healing” as he missed his seventh Angelus prayer.
The 88-year-old head of the Catholic Church left Rome’s Gemelli hospital on March 23
Pope Francis was again absent on March 30 for the Angelus, normally delivered at midday from a window of the Apostolic Palace overlooking Saint Peter’s Square, publishing the text instead.
“Dearest friends, let us live this Lent as a time of healing,” he wrote, referring to the period before Easter, the holiest period in the Christian calendar, celebrated in 2025 on April 20.
“I, too, am experiencing it this way, in my soul and in my body.”
He added: “Frailty and illness are experiences we all have in common; all the more, however, we are brothers in the salvation Christ has given us.”
The Vatican said on March 28 that Pope Francis was showing “slight improvements”, with his voice – strained and weak following his double pneumonia – reported to be stronger.
Doctors said the pope almost died twice during his hospitalisation, the longest and most fraught of his 12 years as head of the Church.
The pope on March 30 offered his prayers for those involved in conflicts in Ukraine, the Palestinian territories and Israel, Lebanon and the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as for quake-hit Myanmar.
He said he was following “with concern” the situation in South Sudan, where there has been heightened confrontation in recent weeks between the rival factions that fought each other in the 2013 to 2018 civil war.
“I renew my heartfelt appeal to all leaders to do their utmost to lower the tension in the country,” he said, urging everyone to put aside their differences and engage in “constructive dialogue”.
Pope Francis also urged new negotiations as soon as possible in war-torn Sudan.
The leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics noted that “thanks be to God, there are also positive events”.
He described a recent border agreement between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan – seen as key for the stability of Central Asia – as an “excellent diplomatic achievement”. AFP
