Since he was hospitalized for two weeks with acute pneumonia, Pope Francis signed himself on the appointment of 20 bishops, accepted the resignation of at least four and approved the transfer of five people on the way to the shrine, according to the daily newsletter on the Vatican website.
Some of the recorded events were more esoteric, such as his appointment of a cardinal who would represent him in April at a 1,000 -anniversary celebration on the crowning of Bolew and lock, the first King of Poland.
Generally, the public tenor of St. Sece changed absent his strongest face and voice – missing the weekly performances of the Pope and his excuses on important global issues, such as canceling Trump’s administration due to the deportation of immigrants. However, the Machines of the Vatican State break through even while the 88-year-old PontiFs lies in the hospital without release on the calendar.
“Francis is still governing, he is in contact with his assistants,” said Matteo Bruni, a spokesman for the Vatican, in response to the question about the Pope’s work. “What he misses is contact with believers, general audience, pastoral activity.”
In a statement on Thursday night, the Vatican said that the Pope’s clinical condition continued to improve. He exchanged the use of high oxygen flow and ventilation masks, he said, and spent the morning doing respiratory physiotherapy and rest, before the afternoon circle of physiotherapy.
“Given the complexity of the clinical picture, the day of clinical stability is required to determine the forecast,” the Vatican states. The Vatican Printing Office added that the Pope is no longer considered in a critical state, but has not yet been out of danger.
However, the whole torture of his extended stay at Gemelli Hospital, the longest of his papacy, without public appearances, awakened old concerns among church experts and observers about who would manage the Church if this or any Pope fell into a coma or otherwise unable.
To some extent, Saint Seli acts similarly to the political system with the president and the Prime Minister. The Pope, the president in this scenario, deals with the main excuses and appointments of politics, while the Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, oversees the daily things that are involved in the leadership of the Vatican itself and the global church.
Authorizations limited only to the Pope include the appointment of the bishop, the acceptance of retirement and the issuance of new decrees to change the Vatican Law. In addition, bureaucracy would probably be a saying of a policy on global import issues, such as negotiating the interruption of fire in Gaza, without its importatura.
Francis’s disease inevitably delays some decisions, which critics of his agenda do not mind. Before he became ill, for example, Francis had fallen apart by the sodality of Christian life, a controversial Catholic organization based in Peru. Some of the supporters of the group hoped that his illness could slow down the implementation of the decision, said John Allen, editor of Crux, an independent internet news that covers the Catholic Church. But Vatican officials and experts said there was no special slowdown during this hospitalization, because the Pope, although sick, remains awake and capable of dealing with those around him.
The job is moving as usual “as long as the pope can understand what people say to him and can sign his name,” said Rev. Thomas J. Reese, a longtime Vatican analyst and author of the book “Within the Vatican: Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church.”
But there are no established legal guidelines for what to do when this is not the case, especially if any incapacity has endured for months, not weeks. In the case of short hospitalization, many of these actions that are already planned could continue without problems.
But the main decisions, such as whom to appoint the Archbishop in the High City, would be problematic. It would also be extremely difficult to remove the wrong cardinal or other prominent figure, experts said.
Pope Francis, like Paul VI in the 1960s, announced that he signed a letter of resignation shortly after taking over the papacy in 2013 in the event that he was ever disabled. But his content remained a secret, and experts indicate numerous legally blurry issues.
First, who decides that the Pope is incapable of being? And second, the church law says that the pope is valid for each resignation, he must be free to choose to make a decision. Some legal experts wonder if the letter written more than a decade ago will bring a rally as a “freely selected” decision.
In recent history, the question was most pronounced during the long fall of Pope John Paul II, who began to suffer from Parkinson’s illness the years before his death in 2005. Although he could still answer “yes” or “no”, his obvious fall in feeding questions in the Vatican mill for rumors of who actually made decisions, said Father Reese.
A far more severe consequence that some veterans Ivan Paul attribute to his slow facilities was the lack of the church’s response to wide accusations of sexual abuse of children by the Catholic clergy.
“The church has paid a significant price for it in 20 years since then,” said Dr. Miles Pattenden, a professor of history and author of “The History of Pope Cambridge.”
The problem of sick Pope is not very new, but it is far more complex in the time of social media, current communication and greater longevity. “In bad old days, doctors would quickly kill him through bleeding and a terrible cure,” said Father Reese, or “just locked him in the back room and led the church.”
Before 1700, there was a precedent of a “cardinal nephew”, a close cousin of a sick Pope, who launched things on his behalf. “The old or older pope who was powerless would remain in bed, and his nephew would lead the government,” said Dr. Pattenden, and while the practice was still existing, the nephew would often become a pope when his older cousin passed away.
Church leaders have long reluctant to define when the Pope can be considered incapable because this interferes with the theory that the Pope must have complete freedom of action, said Mr. Allen. “No one can tell the pope when it’s over,” he said. “It is extremely sensitive to move to the end of the papacy without Pope Express.”
Impacts are visible in specific provisions such as the canon of 335 Vatican Laws, which says that if the Holy Sel is “empty or completely distracted”, then nothing can be changed in the management of the Church. But “completely distracted” is not defined.
Francis’s predecessor, Benedict XVI, resigned for 85 years, citing age and powerlessness, but he was extreme extraordinary – no Pope stepped down in almost 600 years.
Considering the jumps in modern medicine to extend the life, the international group of Catholic legal experts proposed norms to throw out what was “fully interfered”, and invited the transfer of the control body to the entire college of Cardinal or the Commission, depending on how long the Pope had been incompetent. If the Committee of the expert believed that the Pope was inability to irreversible, the cardinals in the girl would have to declare their management days and call the conclave that he appointed a new pope.
But these were just proposals and to date no established law has seen the light of day.
Because the pope’s condition slowly improves, there seems to be less urgency, but depending on how long his hospital stay lasts, it could still have an effect.
The streets of the Vatican and the Church of Rome are full of pilgrims here for the church jubilee year, but their hopes will see Pope Francis were exhausted while he remained in the hospital.
“The big reason that most people would come to Rome during the jubilee year is to see the Pope,” said Mr. Allen. “If you can’t see the Pope, it puts a muffler with things.”
