Pope Francis has been in a Rome hospital for a month, battling double pneumonia and its complications. His condition would be serious for anyone but could be more threatening for an 88-year-old man who had part of a lung removed as a youth and who stubbornly refuses to slow down. While the Vatican reported this week that he is improving, he may be so weakened that, some have speculated, he could decide to step down.
Either way, the fate of a pope remains of great concern among the world’s approximately 1.3 billion Catholics and a source of heightened curiosity for those who see Francis as an increasingly lonely moral voice on the world stage and wonder what kind of pope will eventually succeed him.
The yearning for a leader who puts the needs and interests of others — including the least powerful — ahead of his own is felt especially among the many Americans today who desperately seek a light inside the darkness of Donald Trump.
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With thanks to The New York Times and David Gibson, where this article originally appeared.
