Pope Francis, showing plans to continue on, starts new process for Catholic reforms
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Pope Francis approved the new process for reforms on March 11 from Rome's Gemelli hospital, where he is being treated.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis approved a new three-year process to consider reforms for the global Catholic Church, the Vatican said on March 15, in a sign the 88-year-old pontiff plans to continue on as pope despite his ongoing battle with double pneumonia.
Pope Francis has extended the work of the Synod of Bishops, a signature initiative of his 12-year papacy, which has discussed reforms such as the possibility of women serving as Catholic deacons and better inclusion of LGBTQ people in the Church.
The synod, which held an inconclusive Vatican summit of bishops on the future of the Church in October 2024, will now hold consultations with Catholics across the world for the next three years, before hosting a new summit in 2028.
Pope Francis approved the new process for reforms on March 11 from Rome's Gemelli hospital, where he is being treated, the Vatican said on March 15.
The Pope has been in hospital for more than a month, and his prolonged public absence has stoked speculation
But his friends and biographers have insisted he has no plans to step down, and the approval of a new three-year process indicated he wants to continue on, despite his age and the possibility he might face a long, fraught road to recovery from pneumonia, given his age and other medical conditions.
"The Holy Father... is helping push the renewal of the Church toward a new missionary impulse," Cardinal Mario Grech, the Church official leading the reform process, told the Vatican's media outlet. "This is truly a sign of hope."
After October's inconclusive Vatican summit, which yielded no concrete action on possible reforms, Pope Francis had faced questions of whether his papacy was running out of steam.
Vatican officials had said at the time that the pontiff was still considering future changes, and was waiting to receive a series of ten expected reports about possible reforms this June.
The latest medical bulletins from the Vatican on the Pope's condition in hospital have said he is improving
They have not said when he will be discharged from hospital. REUTERS
