VATICAN CITY (AP) – Sick Pope Francis, who this week is making limited public appearances due to persistent pain, has drawn attention to the plight of the homeless in winter, including a Nigerian man who died freezing near the Vatican.
On Sunday, Francis asked for prayers for the 46-year-old man named Edwin, who he said was “ignored by everyone, abandoned, even by us”. The pontiff said on January 20 “a few meters from St. Peter’s Square, because of the cold, a Nigerian homeless man was found dead”. Early last week, temperatures in Rome dropped below freezing at night.
The day after the Vatican said that Francis, 84, was suffering from sciatica again, an inflammation of the nerves that can affect his lower back and legs, the pope skipped a scheduled Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica. But he appeared in the library of the Apostolic Palace to give his blessing and comment on the Gospel and the situation of those who had no home.
Edwin’s case “adds to that of so many other homeless people who recently died in Rome in the same dramatic circumstances,” said Francis. “Let’s pray for Edwin.”
Francisco often uses his papacy to try to draw attention to the problems of those who live on the fringes of life, including newly arrived migrants and homeless people. Your official alms donor sometimes distributes sleeping bags to those who live on the streets near Vatican City.
It is the second time in recent weeks that Francisco has been harmed by what the Vatican said was sciatica, forcing him to skip events. The latest fight is causing him to postpone his annual speech at the beginning of the year to diplomats accredited to the Holy See, which was scheduled for Monday. Later that day, Francis would be taken to a basilica in Rome to pray with other Christian leaders, but the event will continue without him.
The same painful condition made him skip New Year’s Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica.
So far, a six-day pilgrimage to Iraq in early March is still underway, a trip that Francis hopes to undertake despite the pandemic and violence that plagues the country, including a suicide attack last week that killed 32 people in Baghdad.