Pope Francis has said he would be ready to retire due to serious health problems and if he discern it’s the will of God to stop running the Catholic Church.
Pope Francis has hinted that he can no longer travel like he used to because of his strained knee ligament that showed he needed to slow down and one day possibly retire.
“I think at my age and with these limitations, I have to save[my energy] to be able to serve the church, or on the contrary, think about the possibility of stepping aside,” he said.
For the past few months, he has been using a wheelchair, cane, or walker because of knee pain caused by a fracture and inflamed ligament.
“It’s not strange. It’s not a catastrophe. You can change the pope,” he said.
“The door is open. It is one of the normal options. Up until today, I did not use that door. I did not think it was necessary to think of this possibility but that does not mean that the day after tomorrow I don’t start thinking about it.”
He added: “This trip was a bit of a test. It is true that I can’t make trips in this condition. Maybe the style has to change, make fewer trips, make the trips I have promised to make, re-jig things. But it will be the Lord who decides. The door is open.”
The pope spoke at the end of a week-long journey to Canada in which he traveled to Edmonton, Québec, and Iqaluit on what he called a “penitential pilgrimage” to apologize to the country’s indigenous communities.