Pope Francis was unable to read a speech prepared in advance during his meeting with a delegation of European rabbis this Monday, November 6 morning. “I don’t feel well,” he apologized in a tired voice.
“Idon’t feel well,” said Pope Francis when receiving a delegation from the Conference of European Rabbis on November 6, 2023, apologizing in a tired voice for not reading his speech prepared in advance. The Pope “has a bit of a cold” and wanted to “greet the rabbis individually,” explained the director of the Holy See Press Office, Matteo Bruni, afterwards. The other audiences scheduled on the pontiff’s agenda continued normally.
During an audience broadcast live in the Holy See Press Room, Francis, who will be 87 years old on December 17, greeted his hosts, wishing them “welcome” and looking forward to their visit. But the pope confided to them, in a visibly out of breath voice: “It turns out that I am not feeling well, and for that, I prefer not to read the speech, but to give it to you, and that you take it with you” .
Pope Francis has a bit of a cold and has a long day of audiences.
“Pope Francis has a bit of a cold and has a long day of audiences,” Matteo Bruni said in a statement to journalists. The Pope, he explained, “wanted to greet the European rabbis individually and that is why he gave them his speech.” And to indicate: “For the rest, the Pope’s activities continue on a regular basis.”
Before this meeting, Pope Francis received the President of Catalonia, Pere Aragonès i Garcia. The Spanish delegation said that the meeting lasted around forty minutes and that the conflict in the Holy Land was discussed in particular. After the meeting with the rabbis, the Pope met with the association of the Little Houses of Providence of Gela, before whom he read his speech, also adding a few improvised words. This afternoon, the Argentine pontiff is due to meet some 7,000 children from around the world in the Paul VI Hall of the Vatican .
Hospitalized twice in 2023
This year, Pope Francis has been hospitalized twice, in March for pneumonia, and in June for abdominal surgery. On Italian television on November 1, the head of the Catholic Church was reassuring about his state of health. “Now I feel very good, I can eat everything,” he told journalists.
