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The Independent
11-03-2025
- Health
- The Independent
‘This is not going to last long': Pope Francis predicted short papacy, early death
Pope Francis has often spoken and written about illness, ageing, and death, and has personally instructed his doctors to provide detailed daily updates on his battle with pneumonia. On Monday, his doctors reported that the 88-year-old pontiff was no longer in imminent danger but would remain hospitalised for treatment for several more days. Francis's openness about his health echoes the legacy of St John Paul II, whose struggle with Parkinson's disease was publicly visible for years. However, the Vatican did not acknowledge the condition until after his death. In keeping with his papacy, Francis has been upfront about his health. In 2021, he gave an unprecedentedly candid interview to an Argentine doctor, who published a book detailing the pontiff's physical and mental health history. Last week, Francis recorded an audio message from the hospital, revealing the weakness in his voice and the effort required to speak. Here are a few of Francis's thoughts on illness and death. On ageing Pope Francis has consistently voiced concerns about society's treatment of the elderly, decrying what he sees as a "throwaway culture" that marginalises them once they are no longer deemed productive. The pontiff has been particularly outspoken about the importance of including older people in the life of the church, a stance he emphasised during Pope Benedict XVI 's 10-year retirement. Even as he has aged, and now relies on a wheelchair and walker, Francis' views on ageing have remained consistent. In his 2010 book On Heaven and Earth, co-written with Rabbi Abraham Skorka, Francis criticised the cruelty faced by the elderly, calling out families who neglect their grandparents by sending them to nursing homes and failing to visit. 'The elderly are sources of the transmission of history, the people who give us memories, they are the memory of the people, of a nation, of the family and of the culture, religion,' said Francis, who at the time was the archbishop of Buenos Aires. On death in general In the same book, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio recalled that his grandmother Rosa, who helped raise him, had the words of an adage framed on her bedside table that stayed with him all his life: 'See that God sees you, see that he is watching you, see that you will die and you don't know when.' He referred to the saying again in 2018 in a speech to priests, and that his grandmother had instructed him to recite it every day ''so you will remember that life has an end''. 'I didn't understand much at the time, but that verse, since I was three years old, has stuck with me,' he told the priests. 'And it helped me. The thing was kind of bleak, but it helped me.' On his own mental and physical health Francis disclosed that he underwent weekly psychiatric sessions during Argentina's military dictatorship to manage his anxiety, as revealed in Dr Nelson Castro's 2021 book, The Health of Popes. During an interview with Dr Castro, the pontiff spoke in detail about his past ailments, including a respiratory infection that resulted in the removal of the upper lobe of his right lung, a gangrenous gallbladder, compressed vertebrae, flat feet, and a fatty liver. The most noteworthy revelation was Francis's disclosure that he sought psychiatric help to manage his anxiety while hiding people from the military and helping them leave Argentina. "In those six months she helped me with respect to how to manage the fears of that time," he told Dr Castro. "If you can imagine what it was like to transport someone hidden in the car — covered by a blanket — and pass through military controls … It created an enormous tension in me." He added that the therapy helped him maintain equilibrium in making decisions and that he believes all priests must understand human psychology. On his own death Pope Francis has been contemplating his mortality since the early years of his papacy, suggesting as early as 2014 that his time in office would be brief. During a trip home from South Korea in 2014, he told reporters, "I realise that this is not going to last long, two or three years, and then … off to the house of the Father." The pontiff reportedly told Fidel Castro that while he frequently thinks about death, it holds no fear for him. Francis has also made arrangements for his final resting place, choosing to be buried in the St. Mary Major basilica rather than the Vatican. This decision allows him to be near his beloved icon of the Madonna, the Salus Populi Romani ("Salvation of the People of Rome"). More recently, he has alluded to future events that he anticipates he will not be present for, even hinting at potential successors. In 2023, regarding the Vatican's improving relationship with Vietnam, Francis agreed that the country would be a fitting destination for a papal visit. 'If I don't go, surely John XXIV will,' he said chuckling, referring to a future pope who might be named for the progressive, Vatican II-era pontiff, John XXIII.
Boston Globe
11-03-2025
- Health
- Boston Globe
In his own words: Pope Francis has long been up front about his health problems and eventual death
Francis' candor with his own fragility is very much in keeping with a decision he made early on in his papacy to be up front about his health: He granted an unprecedented tell-all interview to an Argentine doctor who published a book in 2021 detailing Francis' physical and mental health history. And last week, Francis recorded an audio message from the hospital that laid bare the weakness of his voice, and the labored, breathless effort it took for him to utter just a few words. Here are a few of Francis' past musings on sickness, ageing and death and how they might affect the future of his pontificate. Advertisement On growing old: Francis has long complained about the way society treats old people, saying they are part of today's consumerist 'throwaway culture' when they are deemed no longer productive. For that reason especially, he insisted that Pope Benedict XVI continue to be part of the life of the church during his 10-year retirement. Francis' views on ageing have been consistent, even as he himself has aged and become dependent on a wheelchair and walker to get around. In the 2010 book 'On Heaven and Earth,' written alongside his friend the Argentine Rabbi Abraham Skorka, Francis denounced the cruelty that confronts elderly people. He shamed families who shut their grandparents away in nursing homes and neglect to visit them. 'The elderly are sources of the transmission of history, the people who give us memories, they are the memory of the people, of a nation, of the family and of the culture, religion,' said Francis, who at the time was the archbishop of Buenos Aires. Advertisement On death in general: In the same book, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio recalled that his grandmother Rosa, who helped raise him, had the words of an adage framed on her bedside table that stayed with him all his life: 'See that God sees you, see that he is watching you, see that you will die and you don't know when.' He referred to the saying again in 2018 in a speech to priests, and that his grandmother had instructed him to recite it every day ''so you will remember that life has an end.'' 'I didn't understand much at the time, but that verse, since I was three years old, has stuck with me,' he told the priests. 'And it helped me. The thing was kind of bleak, but it helped me.' On his own health problems: The Argentine journalist and physician, Dr. Nelson Castro, revealed in his 2021 book 'The Health of Popes,' that Francis had reached out to him within a few months of his 2013 election with a suggestion that he write a book about the history of the health of the popes, including his own. Castro was granted access to the Vatican Secret Archives to research the lives and deaths of past popes and had a sit-down interview with Francis on Feb. 19, 2019, during which the reigning pope spoke at length and in detail about his various ailments over the years: The respiratory infection that resulted in the removal of the upper lobe of his right lung, the gangrenous gallbladder he had removed when he was provincial superior of the Jesuits, the compressed vertebrae, flat feet and fatty liver he has lived with. Advertisement The most noteworthy revelation was that Francis said he saw a psychiatrist weekly during six months of Argentina's military dictatorship. He had sought out help to manage his anxiety when he was trying to hide people from the military and ferry them out of Argentina. 'In those six months she helped me with respect to how to manage the fears of that time,' he told Castro. 'If you can imagine what it was like to transport someone hidden in the car — covered by a blanket — and pass through military controls. … It created an enormous tension in me.' He said the therapy also helped him to maintain a sense of equilibrium in making decisions of all kinds, and that in general he believes all priests must understand human psychology. 'We should offer a mate to our neuroses,' he said, referring to the South American tea. 'They are our companions for life.' On his own death: As early as 2014 Francis was already assuming his papacy would be short-lived and that his own death was not far off. 'I realize that this is not going to last long, two or three years, and then … off to the house of the Father,' he told reporters in 2014 while traveling home from one of his early foreign trips, to South Korea. He told Castro later that he thought about death — a lot — but that it didn't scare him 'one bit.' Francis made plans, too: He decided his tomb will be in St. Mary Major basilica, not in the Vatican, so he can be near his favorite icon of the Madonna, the Salus Populi Romani ('Salvation of the People of Rome'), which is located there. Advertisement More recently, he has taken to speaking about upcoming events that he is pretty sure he won't be around for, and indicating who might. In 2023, speaking to reporters about the Vatican's warming relations with Vietnam, Francis concurred that the country warranted a papal visit. 'If I don't go, surely John XXIV will,' he said chuckling, referring to a future pope who might be named for the progressive, Vatican II-era pontiff, John XXIII.
Boston Globe
22-02-2025
- Health
- Boston Globe
Headstrong Francis put the Church above his health, Vatican observers say
Advertisement Two days after that, Francis was rushed to the hospital, with what doctors said was a complex medical condition that evolved into pneumonia in his lungs. Many who know him said in interviews that Francis, driven by a sense of mission and a discipline born of his early training, essentially worked himself into the hospital. He is now bedridden after weeks of ceremonies and audiences — both private and public — that only intensified with the start in December of the 2025 Jubilee, a year of faith, penance and forgiveness of sins that takes place only every 25 years. But the pope's grueling schedule — which would exhaust anyone, let alone an 88-year-old with a series of health issues — is in keeping with Francis' personality and with his vision of the papacy, say doctors, biographers and Vatican observers. 'The pope cares a lot about the Church, so it's clear he put the Church first,' Dr. Luigi Carbone, the pope's personal physician at the Vatican, told reporters at a briefing at the hospital Friday. Dr. Sergio Alfieri, another one of the pope's doctors, added that Francis 'doesn't hold back because he is enormously generous, so he tired himself out.' Dr. Sergio Alfieri at at Rome's Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic where Pope Francis is being treated, on Friday. Alessandra Tarantino/Associated Press Francis became pope late in life — he was 76 — and was determined to make the most of it because he suspected that, relatively speaking, he would not hold the position for long. A year into his papacy, he told reporters that he thought he would be pope for two or three years, then 'off to the house of the Father.' Advertisement That prediction was clearly wrong. Instead, he established a schedule — waking up before 5 a.m. and at his desk by 6 a.m. to tackle a full day of work — that Nelson Castro, author of the book 'The Health of Popes,' called 'crazy.' Just last September, Francis took the longest and most complicated trip of his tenure: an 11-day, four-country tour in the Asia-Pacific region. 'For Francis, it's all or nothing,' said Austen Ivereigh, a Catholic commentator and papal biographer. In Francis' view, it was 'an essential dimension of the papacy' that people had constant access to him, and there was no time to be inaccessible for health reasons. A nun prayed at the hospital in Rome where Pope Francis is being treated. Alessandra Tarantino/Associated Press 'His primary concern isn't to extend his life, his primary concern is to exercise the papal ministry in the way that he believes it must be exercised, which is all in, 100%,' Ivereigh said. 'He has a crazy agenda,' said another biographer, Argentine journalist Elisabetta Piqué. Alongside his official morning schedule, he has a parallel, equally full agenda for the afternoon. 'He always says: I'll have time to rest in the next world,' she said. Francis had a deep-seated sense of duty that was instilled in him by the boarding school he attended as a child, run by the Salesian religious congregation, and later by the Jesuit order, which he joined in 1958, said Fabio Marchese Ragona, another biographer. He said that Francis had told him that he had joined the Jesuits 'above all for the discipline,' and that keeping commitments was drilled into him — as was arriving early for appointments. Advertisement Carlo Musso, who worked with Francis on 'Hope,' an autobiography that was published last month, noted: 'The word he used most, the exhortation I remember best, is 'forward.' Even when he was looking back, it was so he could move forward.' Candles were at the foot of a marble statue of late Pope John Paul II outside the Rome hospital. Domenico Stinellis/Associated Press People who know Francis say he is resistant to taking a break, even when he should because of sciatica, a bad knee or recurrent bronchial woes. As a young man, he had the upper lobe of his right lung removed, and he has suffered bouts of influenza and bronchitis during the winter months. 'He's so obstinate; he's a testardo,' said Castro, using the Italian word for stubborn. And the pope has admitted to being 'a very difficult patient,' he added. The pope once told him that he liked to keep his distance from doctors, Castro said, 'meaning that he wants to make the decisions' about what he can and cannot do. Ivereigh said Francis had admitted that one of his 'big faults' was obstinacy. 'He's very strong willed and doesn't readily listen to suggestions that he cut things back,' he said. Musso pointed out that a few hours before he was taken to hospital, Francis held audiences with the prime minister of the Slovak Republic, the president of CNN and representatives of a charity that works in Puerto Rico. 'He has an enormous capacity for work,' he said. The pope does not go away for summer vacations, Musso added. That habit, said Piqué, is a source of chagrin for many Vatican employees. His last real vacation was in 1975, Francis himself said in 'Hope.' Advertisement John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI summered at the papal residence in Castel Gandolfo, although the former also opted for mountain stays in northern Italy. Francesco Antonio Grana, a Vatican reporter for the Rome daily newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano, said it did not help that Francis surrounded himself with 'yes-men' who indulged the pope. 'This hospitalization could have been avoided' had someone put the brakes on the pope's schedule, Grana said. 'I prefer a live pope than a pope who died because he kept one more commitment on his agenda,' he added. 'With Donald Trump in the White House, the world needs a live and combative pope.' The same week that he went into the hospital, Francis wrote an open letter to bishops in the United States criticizing Trump's policy of mass deportations of immigrants, and he has stood up to Trump on issues such as climate change. Francis' workload was not only arduous but also brought him into contact with hundreds of people who could potentially transmit diseases, said Massimo Andreoni, professor emeritus of infectious diseases at the University of Rome Tor Vergata. 'So perhaps he should be more careful when he has a cold or bronchitis and maybe slow down a little and look after himself a little more,' he added. There are a few signs that the pope may be ready to slow down. Francis was visited in the hospital Wednesday by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Reporting on the meeting, the Milan daily newspaper Corriere della Sera wrote that Francis complained to the prime minister: 'The doctors said I have to take some time off' and that 'I have to be careful with my health, otherwise I go straight to heaven.' Advertisement At a news briefing Friday, Francis' doctors made clear they would keep him at the hospital as long as he needed treatment that he could only receive there, rather than bring him home to his residence in Casa Santa Marta. 'We think it's prudent,' said Alfieri. 'If we brought him to Santa Marta, he'd start working like before — we know this.' This article originally appeared in
New York Times
22-02-2025
- Health
- New York Times
Headstrong Francis Put the Church Above His Health, Vatican Observers Say
In the days after the Vatican announced on Feb. 6 that Pope Francis had bronchitis and would be restricting his activities to his residence, he proceeded to hold multiple private audiences a day with groups of nuns, pilgrims and leaders of foundations. On Feb. 9, he presided over an outdoor Mass in St. Peter's Square, where the wind was so strong that it blew his white zucchetto off his head. He could not finish his homily, passing it to an aide and saying, 'I have trouble breathing.' Three days later, at his weekly Wednesday audience, the ailing pope had an aide read his speech. But then he shook hands with dozens of prelates, many leaning over to whisper greetings, and took photos with Spanish faithful, Milanese military recruits and nuns from Mother Teresa's order. Two days after that, Francis was rushed to the hospital, with what doctors said was a complex medical condition that evolved into pneumonia in both his lungs. Many who know him said in interviews that Francis, driven by a sense of mission and a discipline born of his early training, essentially worked himself into the hospital. He is now bedridden after weeks of ceremonies and audiences — both private and public — that only intensified with the start in December of the 2025 Jubilee, a year of faith, penance and forgiveness of sins that takes place only every quarter century. But the pope's grueling schedule — which would exhaust anyone, let alone an 88-year-old with a series of health issues — is in keeping with Francis' personality and with his vision of the papacy, say doctors, biographers and Vatican observers. 'The pope cares a lot about the Church, so it's clear he put the Church first,' Dr. Luigi Carbone, the pope's personal physician at the Vatican, told reporters at a briefing at the hospital on Friday. Dr. Sergio Alfieri, another one of the pope's doctors, added that 'he doesn't hold back because he is enormously generous, so he tired himself out.' Francis became pope late in life — he was 76 — and was determined to make the most of it because he suspected that, relatively speaking, he would not hold the position for long. A year into his papacy, he told reporters that he thought he would be pope for two or three years, then 'off to the house of the Father.' That prediction was clearly wrong. Instead, he established a schedule — waking up before 5 and at his desk by 6 to tackle a full day of work — that Nelson Castro, the author of the book 'The Health of Popes,' called 'crazy.' Just last September, Francis took the longest and most complicated trip of his tenure: an 11-day, four-country tour in the Asia-Pacific region. 'For Francis, it's all or nothing,' said Austen Ivereigh, a Catholic commentator and papal biographer. In Francis' view, it was 'an essential dimension of the papacy' that people had constant access to him, and there was no time to be inaccessible for health reasons. 'His primary concern isn't to extend his life, his primary concern is to exercise the papal ministry in the way that he believes it must be exercised, which is all in, 100 percent,' Mr. Ivereigh said. 'He has a crazy agenda,' said another biographer, the Argentine journalist, Elisabetta Piqué. Alongside his official morning schedule, he has a parallel, equally full agenda for the afternoon. 'He always says, I'll have time to rest in the next world,' she said. Francis had a deep-seated sense of duty that was instilled in him by the boarding school he attended as a child, run by the Salesian religious congregation, and later by the Jesuit order which he joined in 1958, said Fabio Marchese Ragona, another biographer. He said that Francis had told him that he had joined the Jesuits 'above all for the discipline,' and that keeping commitments was drilled into him — as was arriving early for appointments. Carlo Musso, who worked with Francis on 'Hope,' an autobiography that was published last month, noted: 'The word he used most, the exhortation I remember best, is 'forward.' Even when he was looking back, it was so he could move forward.' People who know Francis say that he is resistant to taking a break, even when he should because of sciatica, a bad knee or recurrent bronchial woes. As a young man, he had the upper lobe of his right lung removed, and he has suffered bouts of influenza and bronchitis during the winter months. 'He's so obstinate; he's a testardo,' said Dr. Castro, using the Italian word for stubborn. And the pope has admitted to being 'a very difficult patient,' he added. The pope once told him that he liked to keep his distance from doctors, Dr. Castro said, 'meaning that he wants to make the decisions' about what he can and cannot do. Mr. Ivereigh said that Francis had admitted that one of his 'big faults' was obstinacy. 'He's very strong willed and doesn't readily listen to suggestions that he cut things back,' he said. Mr. Musso pointed out that a few hours before he was taken to hospital, Francis held audiences with the prime minister of the Slovak Republic, the president of CNN and representatives of a charity that works in Puerto Rico. 'He has an enormous capacity for work,' he said. The pope does not go away for summer vacations, Mr. Musso added. That habit, said Ms. Piqué, is a source of chagrin for many Vatican employees. His last real vacation was in 1975, Francis himself said in his autobiography 'Hope.' John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI summered at the papal residence in Castel Gandolfo, though the former also opted for mountain stays in northern Italy. Francesco Antonio Grana, a Vatican reporter for the Rome daily newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano, said it did not help that Francis surrounded himself with 'yes men' who indulged the pope. 'This hospitalization could have been avoided' had someone put the brakes on the pope's schedule, Mr. Grana said. 'I prefer a live pope than a pope who died because he kept one more commitment on his agenda,' he added. 'With Donald Trump in the White House, the world needs a live and combative pope.' The same week that he went into the hospital, Francis wrote an open letter to bishops in the United States criticizing President Trump's policy of mass deportations of immigrants, and he has stood up to Mr. Trump on issues like climate change. Francis' workload was not only arduous but also brought him into contact with hundreds of people who could potentially transmit diseases, said Massimo Andreoni, professor emeritus of infectious diseases at the University of Rome Tor Vergata. 'So perhaps he should be more careful when he has a cold or bronchitis and maybe slow down a little and look after himself a little more,' he added. There are a few signs that the pope may be ready to slow down. Francis was visited in the hospital on Wednesday by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy. Reporting on the meeting, the Milan daily newspaper Corriere della Sera wrote that Francis complained to the prime minister: 'The doctors said I have to take some time off' and that 'I have to be careful with my health, otherwise I go straight to heaven.' At a news briefing on Friday, Francis' doctors made clear they would keep him at the hospital as long as he needed treatment that he could only receive there, rather than bring him home to his residence in Casa Santa Marta. 'We think it's prudent,' said Dr. Alfieri. 'If we brought him to Santa Marta, he'd start working like before, we know this.'
