Pope Francis Thanks World for Prayers in Audio Message from Hospital

The Holy See published an audio message recorded by Pope Francis on Thursday thanking Catholics and others praying for his health as the octogenarian enters day 21 of an extended hospital stay to treat a severe respiratory condition.

The pontiff, age 88, sounded frail in the brief Spanish-language message, in which he sent blessings to his followers.

“I thank you with all my heart for the prayers you offer for my health from [St. Peter’s] Square,” Pope Francis said. “I accompany you from here. May God bless you, and may the Virgin protect you. Thank you.”

Pope Francis was admitted to the Gemelli Hospital in Rome on February 14 with a diagnosis of bronchitis. Vatican officials subsequently announced that the pope was suffering from pneumonia and a “polymicrobial infection of the respiratory tract” and described his health status as “complex.” Authorities have not offered an estimate of how long he will be in the hospital at press time, but described his condition on Thursday as “stable.”

“He has not experienced any episodes of respiratory insufficiency today,” the Thursday health update read. “The Pope has continued both respiratory and motor physiotherapy with beneficial effects. Hemodynamic parameters and blood test results remain stable.”

As of Friday morning, the Vatican updated that the pope enjoyed a “restful night” and is engaging in therapy to recover from his respiratory condition.

“He continues alternating mechanical ventilation at night and high-flow supplemental oxygen during the day with the use of nasal cannulae. The situation appears stable in the context of a complex picture,” the Holy See Press Office explained, according to the Vatican News outlet.

Thousands of believers have congregated in St. Peter’s Square for days to pray for the pope, offering nightly rosaries in his name. The pope’s audio message was broadcast on Thursday night local time to those in the Square prior to the beginning of the nightly rosary.

In addition to the prayers said aloud, Catholics have flooded the Vatican with written messages, illustrations, and other signs of admiration and love for the head of the Church. Abroad, Catholics around the world have sent in their prayers to ease the pope’s pain. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops published a prayer following his hospitalization reading, in part:

Look favorably on your servant Francis, whom you have set at the head of your Church as her shepherd; grant, we pray, that by word and example he may be of service to those over whom he presides so that, together with the flock entrusted to his care, he may come to everlasting life.

The pope’s hospitalization has lasted long enough to coincide with the holiest period of the calendar for Catholics, Lent, which began on Ash Wednesday, March 5. While Pope Francis has not been able to personally preside over services opening the Lenten season, Cardinal Angelo de Donatis read a homily by the pope to those congregated for Mass on Wednesday. The homily addressed the Catholic practice of wearing ashes on one’s forehead on the first day of Lent.

“This brings to mind the memory of what we are, but also the hope of what we will be,” the pope said in his homily. “The ashes remind us that we are dust, but they also set us on a journey towards the hope to which we are called. For Jesus descended to the dust of the earth and, by his Resurrection, has drawn us with himself into the Father’s heart.”

“Despite the masks we wear and the cleverly crafted ploys meant to distract us, the ashes remind us of who we are. This is good for us,” the pope asserted. “It reshapes us, reduces the severity of our narcissism, brings us back to reality and makes us more humble and open to one another: none of us is God; we are all on a journey.”

Pope Francis also discussed physical fragility in the homily.

“Made of ashes and earth, we experience fragility through illness, poverty, and the hardships that can suddenly befall us and our families,” he said. “We also experience it when, in the social and political realities of our time, we find ourselves exposed to the ‘fine dust’ that pollutes our world: ideological opposition, the abuse of power, the re-emergence of old ideologies based on identity that advocate exclusion, the exploitation of the earth’s resources, violence in all its forms and war between peoples.”

Reading the homily, Cardinal De Donatis told the congregation, “We feel deeply united with him [Pope Francis] in this moment, and we thank him for the offering of his prayer and his sufferings for the good of the entire Church and the whole world.”

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