Pope Francis spoke at length to journalists after returning from his trip to Canada. He does not close the door to a resignation. However, the pope intends to “change style” and “do fewer trips” to preserve his health.
Pope Francis said on Saturday that his advanced age and difficulty in walking were leading him into a new, slower phase of his pontificate and reiterated that he would be ready to step down one day if serious health problems prevent him from leading. the Church.
“I don’t think I can continue to travel at the same pace as before,” he told reporters on the plane taking him back to Rome after a week-long trip to Canada.
“I have to preserve myself (…) or decide to withdraw”
Pope Francis, 85, has in recent months used a wheelchair, cane or walker due to pain in his knee caused by a fracture and an inflamed ligament. He walked with a cane to the aft cabin where journalists travel but sat in a wheelchair, for the first time in 37 international trips since he was elected pope in 2013, for the traditional conference of 45-minute post-trip press.
“I think at my age and with this limitation, I have to save myself a bit to be able to serve the Church, or decide to retire,” he said. The pace of the trip to Canada, centered on his apology for the Church’s role in residential schools intended to assimilate Indigenous children, was slower than in the past, with typically only two events a day and long periods of rest. Francois said he preferred not to have knee surgery because he didn’t want to experience the negative long-term side effects of anesthesia again that he suffered after bowel surgery a year ago.
“But I will try to keep traveling in order to be close to people, because it is a way of serving,” he said. He said he would first go to the places he has already promised to go, such as South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lebanon and possibly Kazakhstan, before deciding on his future trips. .
“The door is open”
“I have all the good will but we’ll have to see what the leg says,” he said. In an interview with Reuters this month, Francois said he had no plans to resign anytime soon. He has, however, often said he could follow the example of Pope Benedict, who in 2013 became the first pope in 600 years to step down rather than rule for life. “This, in all honesty, is not a disaster. There may be a change of pope, there is no problem with that,” he said.
“The door is open. This is one of the normal options. Until today I haven’t used this door. I didn’t think it was necessary to think about this possibility but that doesn’t mean not that the day after tomorrow I don’t start thinking about it.”
“This trip was a bit of a test. It’s true that I can’t do trips in these conditions. Maybe we need to change our style, do fewer trips, do the trips I promised to do, reorganize things. But the Lord will decide. The door is open,” Pope Francis also said.
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