Pope Francis says former pope Benedict ‘very sick,’ asks for prayers | 24CA News
Former pope Benedict XVI, a hero to conservative Catholics and who in 2013 grew to become the primary pontiff in 600 years to step down, is “very sick,” his successor Pope Francis stated Wednesday, asking Catholic Church members to hope for him.
Bishops from Europe, the United States and past urged the trustworthy to maintain Benedict of their ideas, after the Vatican adopted Francis’s announcement with a press release saying Benedict had suffered a sudden “worsening” of his well being.
“I would like to ask all of you for a special prayer for pope emeritus Benedict, who, in silence, is sustaining the Church,” Francis stated in Wednesday’s shock announcement made on the finish of his weekly basic viewers.
“Let us remember him. He is very sick, asking the Lord to console and sustain him in this witness of love for the Church, until the end,” Francis stated, talking in Italian.
The Vatican assertion stated Benedict was receiving fixed medical consideration and his situation was beneath management.
Francis, who visited the previous pontiff after making the announcement, has usually praised Benedict, saying it was like having a grandfather at residence. But the presence of two males wearing white within the Vatican has at occasions been troublesome.
Conservatives have appeared to the previous pope as their normal bearer and a few ultra-traditionalists even refused to acknowledge Francis as a authentic pontiff.
They have criticized Francis for his extra welcoming strategy to gays and to Catholics who divorced and remarried outdoors the Church, saying each have been undermining conventional values.
Catholic Church leaders from Germany, Britain, the United States and elsewhere urged the trustworthy on social media to hitch prayers for Benedict, the pontiff for nearly eight years earlier than he retired.
“This morning I received the news that there is great concern in Rome about the health of the pope emeritus. And so we especially want to include him in our prayers,” German Cardinal Reinhard Marx, Archbishop of Munich, advised churchgoers.
Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, head of Italy’s bishops convention, requested Italians to maintain Benedict of their ideas “in this moment of suffering and trial.”
Until a number of weeks in the past, those that had seen Benedict stated his physique was very frail, however his thoughts was nonetheless sharp.
Reports of respiratory issues
Italian news experiences stated he had been affected by respiratory issues over the Christmas interval.
The Vatican didn’t give any particulars of his situation. There was no fast response to a request for remark from Benedict’s personal secretary.
One of the newest identified images of Benedict was taken on Dec. 1, when he met the winners of a prize for theologians named after him. He was seated and appeared exceptionally weak.
Since resigning, Benedict has been residing in a former convent contained in the Vatican gardens, together with his secretary, Archbishop Georg Ganswein, and some different aides and medical employees.
Benedict introduced his intention to resign on Feb. 11, 2013, stunning a gathering of cardinals. He stated he not had the bodily and psychological power to run the Church.
He formally stepped down on Feb. 28 that yr, transferring quickly to the papal summer time residence south of Rome whereas cardinals from around the globe got here to Rome to decide on his successor.
Francis, the primary pope from Latin America, was elected to succeed him on March 13, 2013.
Benedict, the primary German pope in 1,000 years, had been elected on April 19, 2005, to succeed the broadly in style Pope John Paul II, who reigned for 27 years.
Cardinals had chosen Benedict from amongst their quantity in search of continuity and what one referred to as “a safe pair of hands.”
For practically 25 years, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he was the highly effective head of the Vatican’s doctrinal workplace, then generally known as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).
