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By Khaleda Rahman
National Correspondent
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Pope Francis has downplayed health issues and insisted he has no plans to resign.
"I am well," the 88-year-old says in his new memoir released on Tuesday Hope: The Autobiography, Reuters reported. "The reality is, quite simply, that I am old."
He adds that the church is "governed using the head and the heart, not the legs."
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The Vatican press office has been contacted for comment via email.
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Why It Matters
Francis, the first pope from Latin America, has led the Catholic Church since 2013. Aged 88, he is now the oldest pope in more than a century and has battled a series of health issues in recent years.
In 2021, he had part of his large intestine removed. He was hospitalized twice in 2023, once due to a respiratory infection and the other time to undergo surgery to repair a hernia in his abdominal wall and remove scar tissue.
He often uses a wheelchair and last week asked an aide to read most of a speech because he was suffering from a cold.
What to Know
"Each time a pope takes ill, the winds of a conclave always feel as if they are blowing," Francis writes in his new memoir, referring to centuries-old tradition of cardinals gathering in the pope's official residence, the Sistine Chapel, after a pontiff's death to elect the next.
"The reality is that even during the days of surgery I never thought of resigning."
Hope is the second of two books released in two years by the pope. Life: My Story Through History was released in March last year.
*Hope'*s, drawn from conversations with Italian journalist Carlo Musso, was initially planned to be published after Francis' death, but it is being released now in more than 80 countries at Francis' request to coincide with the start of the Catholic Holy Year.
The book'sItalian publisher, Mondadori, has called it the first autobiography ever written by a sitting pope.
Pope Pius II's autobiographical chronicles, The Commentaries, were produced during his lifetime in the mid-fifteenth century.
The book recounts Francis' life growing up in Argentina—he was born Jorge Bergoglio in Buenos Aires—his career as a bishop in his home country and some of his decisions as leader of the Catholic Church.
In the book, Francis defends his decision last year to allow priests to offer blessings for same-sex couples, according to Reuters.
"It is the people who are blessed, not the relationships," he says. "Everyone in the Church is invited (for a blessing), including people who are divorced, including people who are homosexual, including people who are transgender."
He adds: "Homosexuality is not a crime, it is a human fact."
What People Are Saying
Pope Francis' X account on Sunday said: "The Holy Year is an opportunity to change our life, reevaluate our thinking, and start anew by learning from Jesus and placing our hope in God. This is the meaning of the Jubilee pilgrimage."
The Guardian newspaper's review of the book says it "skates over" a scandal in 2018 when Francis accused victims of a predator priest in Chile of slandering a bishop they said had known about the abuse. "Nor does he explain how he was unaware of accusations of sexual misconduct against the American cardinal Thomas McCarrick until 2018, despite reports of them to the Vatican," the review adds.
A review in the Financial Times said: "Hope is not always believable. Yet its enthusiasm for human interaction is, like the urge for autobiography, surprisingly hard to resist."
What's Next
Although Francis has said he has no plans to resign, there has been speculation about who could be chosen to be the next pontiff.
A recently launched website provides details about every cardinal, with detailed profiles on the "papabili"—the leading candidates to be elected the next pontiff.
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